


Osiris Blues

by HomuraBakura



Series: Yu-Gi-Oh! RED [2]
Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! GX
Genre: Ableism, Bullying, Canon Extension, Fake Yu-Gi-Oh Cards, Gen, Next-Gen, OC-centric, Post-Series, School, Superpowers, Yu-Gi-Oh Typical Violence and Action, a little more plot this time
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-01
Updated: 2018-09-30
Packaged: 2019-06-25 11:26:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 31
Words: 109,774
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15639786
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HomuraBakura/pseuds/HomuraBakura
Summary: It's a brand new year at Duel Academia, and Saki and crew are excited for their second year!  Things get a little hectic, though, as they juggle magic classes, Duel Spirit shenanigans, the ire of Obelisk Blue, and some very surly first-years.  Besides, what even were the long-term effects of their accidental adventure last year?  One thing's for sure, nothing is ever boring at Duel Academia's Osiris Dorm!





	1. Game Start!!  The New Year At Duel Academia Begins!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's a brand new year at Duel Academia, and changes are already afoot! Hopefully, though, the most important things will stay the same.

“All right!  Everyone make sure you grab your stuff!  Anything left on the boat before it heads back will be thrown into the sea!”

Saki hurriedly scooped up her twin duffel bags, draping them criss cross over her shoulders and hurrying to the ramp.  Her heart hammered in her chest — they were finally here! She’d had to take the latest boat and none of her friends had been on board, but she was finally here!!

The sight was, she thought, probably the most welcome one in the world.  The high afternoon sun sparkled over the red, yellow, and blue domes of the main school building down the long winding road.  The woods rustled, and birds sang along the breeze as a cool spring wind fluttered her hair. The chatter and push of a hundred students all laughing and shouting as they bustled down the ramp pushed Saki along, until she was stumbling off.

Her bags swayed, and pulled her off balance.  She yelped, hopping along on one foot, arms wheeling, trying to stay steady.  For a moment, the whole world twisted.

And then two pairs of hands grabbed hold of her shoulders, and hauled her back.

“Whoa!  I was gonna ask if you’d had a nice trip, but not like that!”

Saki’s momentary dizziness from her near fall faded instantly.  She whirled around to face her rescuers.

Nina grinned, bright eyed, and Minato rolled their eyes.  Miu was behind them, rubbing at one eye with her still too-long sleeve, as though she’d just woken up.

“Only here for two minutes and you’re already in a crisis?  Sounds like Duel Academia all right,” they said.

“Guys!” Saki said.  “I missed you!”

She threw her arms around all of them.  Minato yelped, but Nina just threw her arms around her back, squeezing them both with a giggle.  Miu nestled herself in the middle of everyone, not hugging anyone, but clearly enjoying being tucked inside the hug.  Another set of arms grabbed all four of them from behind, nearly lifting them up.

“Ahh!! Saki’s back!  Everyone’s finally here!!”

Taro, the third hugger, let out a little happy yip that drew a couple of stares from the none Osiris kids who were making their way towards the school building.

“Making an entrance, I see,” said another cheery voice, and Saki and the others untangled themselves from the hug.

Somehow, it was still a little surprising to see Kaede there in her yellow uniform, arms folded and lips grinning.  Kaede slapped Saki on the shoulder and Saki laughed, going in for a hug.

“Hey, you’re usually the late one,” she said.  “I’m just copying you.”

“Bad plan,” Kaede teased.  She ruffled Saki’s hair out of place as they broke apart.  “Anyway, you’re just about perfectly on time. The opening assembly starts in an hour.”

“Just long enough to get you settled!” Nina said, grabbing Saki’s hands and jumping up and down.  “We’re in the upperclassmen dorm this year!! Oh my gosh, we’re gonna be senpai!! I can’t wait to meet the new students!  Oh! We decided we’re gonna have another sleepover party in the abandoned dorm to welcome everyone!”

“We almost died because of whatever evil magic was in there last year, and you want to go  _ back _ ?” Saki said.

“Yuki-sensei said it was okay.  Miu asked,” said Miu. “Or...well...”

She tilted her head in thought, one finger pressed to her lips through her too-long sleeve.

“Actually, Yuki-sensei said that he was too tired to stop us from doing dumb shit, so he might as well be informed when we’re going to do it so he can keep things safe.”

Saki couldn’t help but let out a spluttering laugh.  Her chest warmed. This place felt more familiar to her than home already, and coming back was like having a whole anvil lifted off her shoulders.  Her heart raced with excitement. It was a new year: new students, new dorm, new experiences, but the same old friends and teachers that she knew and loved.  This was going to be a great year.

“That sounds like Yuki-sensei all right,” she said.  “Okay, well, we don’t want to miss that assembly! Let’s get my stuff dropped off so we can head out!”

She grabbed Miu’s hand, and Kaede’s in her other, and the whole group barrelled off, giggling.  Saki didn’t even care that some of the kids were staring at them, and that a few of them seemed to make some snide remark about Osiris as they ran past.

This was going to be a  _ great _ year.  She could sense it.

* * *

The sound of feet shuffling in across the squeaky wooden floor was a little bit grating, and yet, there was something comforting about it as well.  Minato fixed their collar, shoulder getting pressed up against Saki on one side and Nina on the other. There were no chairs for the assembly, so they all had to stand in their class rows.  Obelisk was in the section in front of them, and every now and then, Minato would see one of them poke another and point back at Osiris, sniggering. Minato just smirked back at them, even though they couldn’t see it.  If only they knew what they were missing out on. Minato just hoped that the first-years weren’t taking it too hard yet. There wasn’t a chance to tell them about the truth until the dorm meetings this evening.

Nina and Taro were whispering hurriedly beside them, and they glanced over.

“What’s going on?” they whispered.

“We’re making a bet,” Nina whispered back.  “I haven’t seen Samejima-sensei anywhere. I think he retired.”

“He would have said something at the end of last year!” Taro said.  “I think he’s just resting til the opening.”

“Maybe he’s dead,” Morgan said from behind them, wiggling her eyebrows.

“Oh, don’t be morbid,” said Anani, her cheeks turning literally a little bit green.  She was wearing her disguise colors of peachy-colored skin and straw-blond hair, and it always looked a bit odd to see her like that.  She forced away the spot of green that had flared over her cheeks, and blushed pink instead.

The shuffle of feet slowed as up on the stage, several adults walked up the stairs.  Most of them settled themselves into the chairs near the back of the stage, but one familiar figure made her way over to the podium.

Tenjoin Asuka tapped the microphone once with a finger.  She wasn’t wearing the Ra Yellow dorm advisor uniform that Minato remembered her most vividly in from last year — instead, she was wearing the same red-colored uniform that Samejima-sensei had once worn.

“Good morning, students,” Tenjoin said, smiling brightly.  “And welcome! Congratulations on your acceptance into Duel Academia for our new students, and welcome back to our old.  It is good to see everyone.”

Nina was elbowing Taro in the side rapidly, and Taro looked disappointed.

“My name is Tenjoin Asuka,” Tenjoin said.  “Some of you from last year may remember me as one of the dorm advisors for Ra Yellow, and your Duel Tactics teacher.  This year, however, I can introduce myself as the new headmaster of Duel Academia. Samejima Nobu, our headmaster until last year, has decided to retire.”

“Pay up!!” Nina hissed triumphantly at Taro.  Taro sighed, and handed her what appeared to be an unopened package of Duel Monsters cards.

“Rather than start your year with a long and boring welcoming speech, let me just say this,” Tenjoin said, smiling over the crowd.  “All of you who are here at Duel Academia, are all here for a reason. No matter your dorm, your grades, or your standing, every single one of you is a part of a grand tradition, and a greater family here.  I hope that this can be a place where you can feel like you belong while you chase your dreams and apply to your studies.”

She bowed, and there was a quick smattering of surprised applause at how short the address was.

“The rest of the day will be yours to get yourselves settled in, learn your schedules, ask questions, meet your friends and roommates, and attend your dorm meetings.  Let me introduce your dorm heads so that you can follow them to your dorms.”

She picked up a clipboard from the podium.

“For Obelisk Blue, you’ll be with dorm advisors Chronos de Medici and Ayukawa Emi.”

Minato recognized them from last year, though they were privately surprised that Samejima had retired and Chronos hadn’t.  He still looked exactly the same too, like he hadn’t aged a day since the last time they’d seen him. He was still smiling that huge, silly grin, even, looking more excited than even the students about a new school year.

“We shoulda bet on whether Chronos-sensei would be here, he’s like ancient,” Nina said, nudging Taro.

“Well, too late now,” Taro said.

“For Ra Yellow, your new advisors will be Misawa Daichi and Misawa Tania,” Asuka said.

“Huh?  Are they married?  Can you have married dorm advisors?” Saki whispered.

Minato definitely didn’t recognize the new Ra Yellow advisors.  The man was taller than Asuka, with a thick dark beard and bushy dark hair.  He looked kind of like his advisor uniform didn’t quite fit his shoulders, like he was about to almost explode from inside it.  The woman had pretty much the same physique, if not a little broader, and her own jacket was hanging open. Her skin was darker than his, and  her auburn hair was cut in a faux hawk. There was a scar over one of her eyes, and when she grinned, Minato could almost imagine fangs. Saki gasped softly beside Minato.

“What?” they whispered.

“She’s a Duel Spirit,” Saki whispered back.  “She’s...a tiger.”

Her eyes flickered as Minato tried to process this information.  They glanced at Saki, who was waving across the aisle to where Kaede was making a wide eye, incredulous grin at Saki.  They sort of flapped their hands at each other as though they were attempting sign language and failing miserably. Saki waved her back finally, mouthing ‘I’ll explain later.’

“And finally, for Osiris Red, you’ll be with Johan Andersen and Yuki Judai.”

Judai popped upwards immediately, looking more like an excited child than the other students.  He was still wearing the exact same ratty old Osiris jacket, and he waved ecstatically at the Osiris Reds.  Johan stood too and raised one hand in greeting. 

Nina smacked Minato in the shoulder when she leaped up and down waving both arms in a wave back.

“All right!  That’s all I have for today, so, students, please follow your dorm advisors back to your dorms so you can get settled in,” Tenjoin said.  “Remember, classes start bright and early tomorrow, so don’t stay up too late tonight!”

The group was already breaking off into clumps of excited chatter, as students filtered off towards one of the three doors where the dorm advisors had moved to wait.  Nina bolted for Judai and Johan immediately, Taro on her heels. Minato turned to Saki, who was still waving and flapping her hands at Kaede.

“Are you going to tell her that her dorm advisor is a tiger?” Minato asked with a grin.

“Well, she knows everything else already, she might as well know that,” Saki said.  “Kaede!!”

Kaede quickly said something to the girl she was standing next to, waved, and then jogged over to Saki.  The other Osiris Reds were starting to filter towards Judai and Johan, who were counting off kids with their clipboards.

“Whew!  Looks like an interesting year,” Kaede said when she reached them, grinning.  “Did you see our new dorm advisors? They look like goddamn black ops guys. Like they’re gonna bust some heads.  Ooh, Saki, are they magic or anything?”

“Well, I think one of them might actually be a Duel Spirit,” Saki said.

“No way!  Is it the woman?  She’s hot.”

A whistle rang over the gym.

“Oy, Ras!  Let’s get going, don’t wanna lose anyone!”

It was the woman, Tania, who had shouted, waving one very muscled arm over her head.  Kaede made a fake swoon at Saki.

“I’m just saying, she could bench press me and I would thank her,” Kaede said.  “But let’s save the chit-chat, okay? I’m coming to your abandoned dorm sleepover thing — if that’s okay, I mean.”

“Oh!  Of course it is!”

Saki looked really happy, she was practically glowing.  Minato couldn’t help but smile. They still remembered how hard it had been for Saki to try and push out the words to her friend on the boat on the way home at the end of last school year, explaining her dorm and what she could do.  They and the others had helped by explaining their own role in the craziness of last year, and for her part, Kaede had been understanding. Saki must be glad that she and her friend could finally be open with each other.

“Great!  We’ll have to catch up about what we all did on break!  I have some great stories!”

The glow in Saki’s eyes faded, and Minato noticed immediately.  Kaede was hurrying too much to see, though, as she grabbed Saki in a big hug and then popped back, waving as she ran to join the other Ra Yellows.

Minato glanced at Saki for a moment, trying to think of what they should say.

“Hey,” they said.  “You okay?”

Saki seemed to blink out of a trance.  She smiled, but somehow there was less sparkle to it.

“Totally!” she said.  “I’m super excited to meet all the new Reds.  Let’s go!”

She hurried off, and Minato hesitated before following her.

She’d closed off when the topic of break had come up.  Had something happened on break?

They shook their head.  It wasn’t going to do any good to press her now.  At least, she seemed happy now that she was here. And she was right.  There were other exciting things to focus on for now. Minato took their hands out of their pockets, and hurried off after Saki with the others.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WE'RE BACK!!!!! I can't even begin to express to y'all how freaking excited I am to be back to these characters and this world. I've worked super hard on it this year and put in the time and effort to make an outline before hand instead of flying off the cuff, but I hope that the fun, eccentric essence of GX still comes through. I'm really excited for you all to meet our new first-years and see what new fun stuff we've got going on at DA this year, and I hope you're all excited too! Thank you for joining me once again on this journey and I hope you have fun!


	2. Welcome Back Everyone — Or Goodbye???

“Wow, the upperclassmen dorm is way nicer looking, huh?” Taiki said.

“I dunno, I liked having our doors go right to the outside.  It was like camping!” Taro said, his tail wagging.

“We don’t have to have bunk beds here, though,” Saki said.  “That’s a relief. I hate both parts of a bunk bed.”

The entry hall of the upperclassmen Osiris Dorm was familiar, at least.  Saki had been here a lot to see Saya and some of the others last year. Still, it was kind of surprising to think that this was home now.  Part of her agreed with Taro — she sort of missed the quaint feel of the underclassmen dorm.

“Where’s everybody at?” Nina bellowed, running ahead.  “Dorm meeting in an hour!”

“It’s a whole hour, give people a chance to put their things away,” Minato said, rolling their eyes.

But a pair of faces popped up over the railings of the second floor, and a twin pair of grins shone down at them.

“Ah!  Ji-U! Eun!” Nina said, waving both arms.

The twins grinned and stood up straight from behind the railing.

“Thought that was your voice,” said one of the pair — Saki was awful at telling them apart.

“It was about time it got lively around here,” said the other.  “Everyone’s been so quiet.”

“Except for the screaming earlier,” said one.

“Oh yeah.  Someone found the last ghost Saito left behind.”

A very pale looking Hanako peeked out of her room on the first floor, to the right of the stairs, and Saki had a feeling she was the one who had found the last ghost.  

“Don’t use the baths yet,” she said.  “There’s a drowned looking woman with her hair all over her face sitting in it.”

“Dude _really??”_ Nina said.  She immediately bolted off towards the bathroom, Taro running excitedly after her.  Saki felt briefly faint, and she probably would have swooned if not for Minato grabbing her arm.

“Noted,” she said dizzily.  “Did you tell Yuki-sensei?”

“Haven’t seen him here yet, I think he and Andersen-sensei are with the first years right now,” said one of the twins.  “Oh, and also: don’t look in any mirrors too long. We’re not convinced Yuki-sensei exorcised Bloody Mary yet.”

“Miu, I’m breaking all of the mirrors that might be in our room,” Saki said.

“Miu is okay with that.”

“Let’s get our stuff put away before the dorm meeting,” Minato said.  “We can deal with ghosts later.”

Saki opened up her pager to check her room assignment.  She and Miu were still roommates, and she was pretty glad for that.  Miu was a great roomie — she didn’t make messes, she wasn’t noisy, and she didn’t stay up late.  Also, she was great at cuddling. She was like a cat, and she wasn’t even half or full duel spirit.

“We’re on the first floor,” Saki said.  “Down the hall.”

“Catch you later then, I’m still with Hanako,” Minato said.

“See you at the meeting!”

Saki and Miu headed down the hall.  There were actual nameplates on the doors this time, so Saki checked to see who all was down this way.  Taiki left them at the room next to Minato and Hanako’s, and as they entered the actual right hand hallway, there were two rooms on each side of the hall.  Nina and Anani’s room was labeled as the first lefthand one, and Morgan and Akiara’s room was the one on the right. Saki and Miu were in the lefthand room at the end of the hall, so the room across from them was empty.

“All right,” Saki said, sighing with relief at the room.  It was bigger than their last dorm, and there were two beds so that they each had a half of the room to themselves.  No more bunk beds for her!

Miu immediately went to her bed, and flopped face first onto it.

“Soft,” she sighed.  Mewfeuille appeared beside her, yawning and curling up right beside her head.  Angel poked his head out from under the desk and purred.

“You like it too, Angel?” Saki said.

Angel purred in agreement, and extracted himself from where he’d draped over the legs of the chair, to pad over to Saki and rub his body against her legs.  She reached down to scratch his head.

“Don’t sleep through the meeting,” she told Miu.

“Don’t forget to wake Miu up,” said Miu.

Saki rolled her eyes, but she smiled.  A lot of things seemed very much the same.

* * *

At about a quarter til the meeting, Daitokuji-sensei stuck his head through their door.  Saki shrieked in spite of herself, throwing her notebooks that she’d been sorting into the air.

“Oh,” she said, blushing.  “It’s just you, Daitokuji-sensei.”

“Sorry about the surprise,” he said, looking very spooky with his transparent body half sticking through the very solid door.  “Meeting’s starting soon! I’m sure you’re all getting hungry too.”

Saki’s stomach growled, and she blushed again as the sound caused Miu to yawn and sit up.  Mewfeuille dragged itself into her lap and curled up again.

“The mess hall is in the opposite wing on the first floor, across from the baths,” Daitokuji said.  “Fifteen minutes!”

He popped back through the door, and outside, Saki could hear the heavy padding of Pharaoh walking away down the hall, probably having swallowed Daitokuji’s soul again.

“I wonder how the meeting with the first years went,” Saki said, as Miu slid off the bed and rubbed her eyes sleepily.  “I mean, I wonder how they took learning the secret. What do you think they’re like? I can’t wait to meet them. I mean, I wonder what all powers they have and what units they’ll be in and —”

“Sacchan.  Breathe,” Miu told her, patting her on the arm.

Saki took a deep gasp.  She blushed yet again.

“Sorry,” she said.  “I’m just excited. We’re senpai now!  We have to make a good impression.”

“Not really,” Miu said, yawning.  “We don’t _have_ to.”

“Okay, well I want to!”

She led the way into the hall.  She could see Anani, finally in her natural white colors, laughing at something that Nina was waving her arms and yelling about.  As Saki and Miu made their way up, the door beside them opened, and a nervous looking Akiara peeked out.

“Don’t be so shy!” Morgan said behind her, pushing the door open.  “Ah! Good evening, darlings. How have you been?”

“Doing all right, how about you, Morgan?” Saki said.

“Well, I had a tragic accident,” said Morgan, grinning.

“You lost an arm?” Saki said, rolling her eyes.

“Nope,” Morgan said.  “I got cut in half.”

And she grabbed herself by the waist and physically lifted her torso off her hips.  Saki groaned, covering her eyes.

“Oh, god, really??” she said.  “How much worse do you have to make it?”

“Excuse you, I worked very hard getting myself to the point where I could do that,” Morgan said.  “And you have no idea how heavy it is to lift yourself like that.”

She huffed, though she seemed quite pleased with herself, and when Saki looked back, she had reattached herself and sauntered down the hall.  Akiara was left in the doorway, looking pale and nervous as usual. Before Saki could say anything, though, Akiara let out a small squeak.

“Hi!  Good to see you!”

She scurried off, blushing.  Saki watched her go, and then glanced at Miu.  Miu shrugged.

“Miu thinks that was progress for Akiara-chan,” Miu said.

Saki laughed.  

“Sure does seem like it,” she said.  “Come on, we’re going to be the last ones there!”

They hurried down the hall.  Saki could hear Nina still talking even through the door, yelling about the ghost she’d seen in the bath.

“For real, she looked super drowned and shit!!”

Saki pushed the door open, and saw Nina sitting on top of one of the tables in a decently sized mess hall.  Taro was standing next to her, his tail wagging like crazy.

“And when her hair parted she had the most wicked creepy face!  I told her but she didn’t seem like she thought it was a compliment.  And then she tried to pull me into the bath with her hair and Yuki-sensei had to — oh, Sacchan!!  Did you hear about my and Taro’s adventure??”

“Don’t want to,” Saki said, feeling sick.  “I’m never bathing again.”

“You’ll stink,” said Miu, looking annoyed by the idea.

“Ah, and there’s everyone!”

The voice was cheerful and familiar, and it made Saki perk up immediately.  Johan Andersen was at the end of the hall, holding a clipboard and checking off names.  Yuki Judai was next to him. Both of them were smiling, and Yuki-sensei looked like he was about to implode with excitement, almost as much as Taro did.

“Welcome back everybody!” he said.  “How are you all doing?”

A chorus of “greats” “goods” and “bleghs” rose up from all around the mess hall.  Saki slid into a chair at the back with Miu.

“Looks like everyone is accounted for.  Nice job guys. Last year I had to hunt people down,” Andersen-sensei said.

“That’s cause Kotone decided she wanted to rewire her room last year,” one of the twins said.  “And then she and Jian took the power out and no one could see where they were going.”

“Hey!  We got it back on!” Jian shouted.  The chubby girl winked at some of the others, sending up a chorus of giggles from a few of them.

“Well, at any rate,” Andersen-sensei said, rolling his eyes with a smile.  “I’m glad to see you all here and well. And I’m looking forward to another year with you all.”

“Heck yeah!” Nina shouted.  Behind her, Lindbloom from third year rolled her eyes and dropped her head on the table.  Mostyn patted her on the back reassuringly.

“Let’s just go over some housekeeping things,” Andersen-sensei said.  “First off: all second years, you’re on the first floor, and third-years are on the second.  My room is on the first floor on the left side of the stairs. If you need anything from me, don’t hesitate to come find me.  There’s a board on my door that says where I am if I’m not in the dorm.”

“Even if it’s the middle of the night?” asked Taiki.

“No matter what time it is, if you need me, come and find me,” Andersen-sensei said.

“I’ll still be over at the first years dorm, but if you can’t find Johan, you can come look for me at any time too,” Yuki-sensei said.  “But don’t be walking around campus in the middle of the night.”

“Speaking of which...curfew is nine pm,” Andersen-sensei said, looking pointedly in the direction of the twins, and then at Reina, who was sitting in the front row.  “Please try to be in the dorm by then.”

The twins giggled.  Reina echoed “curfew is nine pm” but there was a tone to her voice almost like a laugh that made Saki think she was planning of breaking that rule already.

“It should be quiet in the dorm by ten,” Andersen-sensei continued.  “And while I’m not going to make any rules about how to keep your own space organized...keep all your own stuff in your own room.”

“Magic practice needs to be done with great care, and no psychic duelist summoning in the dorm,” Yuki-sensei said.  “We can’t fix the roof every time someone summons a dragon too big to fit inside.”

“Ah, damn,” Nina said, pouting.

“But that’s all the boring stuff,” Andersen-sensei said.  “I just have one last thing to share with you all, the second-years in particular.  If you could open up your pagers, you should have a message there.”

There was a rustle of pockets and a few scattered swears from people who forgot theirs.  Saki pulled hers out of her pocket, blinking at the new notification.

“While we all know the truth about the Osiris Dorm, the rest of the outside does not,” Andersen-sensei said.  “And we understand that...that can be difficult.”

“First-year, we require all of you kids with powers to be in the Osiris Dorm, so that you can all get settled and start to understand what you’re doing,” Yuki-sensei said.  “But...after second-year, you have the option to transfer up, based on your grades.”

Saki stared at her message.  Obelisk Blue. Her grades had landed her a qualification for Obelisk Blue.

“You mean, we won’t be in Osiris anymore?? What about our training?” Nina said.

“You’ll still participate in our normal magic classes,” Yuki-sensei said.  “But if you transfer into another dorm, you’ll of course get the benefits that come with that other dorm, and...well, I know for some of you, you’re worried about college, and Osiris Red doesn’t always...look good on a transcript.”

For a moment, Saki’s entire brain went quiet.  She wasn’t even positive what she herself was thinking about.  All she could see was the words Obelisk Blue labeled on her duel screen.  A hand rose up in front of her: Hanako.

“If we transfer to another dorm, we’ll move out of here, right?” Hanako said.

“Yes,” said Andersen-sensei.  “I don’t want you all to worry about that right now.  You’ll have other opportunities to transfer at midterms and in your third-year, but if you want to transfer for first semester, I’ll need you to submit the application to me by tomorrow morning.”

For some reason, this announcement seemed to have sobered up the excited mood.  Everyone was very quiet all of a sudden. Saki herself felt somehow hollow. It was true, Osiris Red wouldn’t look good on her college transcripts, no matter what the truth was.  It was the price they paid for privacy and secrecy in learning their powers. She could still take her Osiris classes if she transferred.

She could...still take Osiris classes.  She’d just be a Blue instead.

“Think on it overnight,” Andersen-sensei said.  “For now, that’s all I’ve got. So let’s eat.”

Saki couldn’t even focus on her food.  She went up the line to get a plate, but the whole room was still very quiet, none of the cheer and excitement for the new year that the meeting had started off with.  She slid back into her table with her food, and pushed it around her plate with her chopsticks.

Miu was nibbling away, feeding bits to Mewfeuille.  Saki glanced at her — she didn’t seem any different at all.  Miu never seemed fazed by anything.

“What are you going to do?” Saki asked.

“About what?” said Miu.

“I mean, the transfer.”

Miu yawned.

“Miu is staying here,” she said.  “Ra Yellow looks boring.”

Right.  That seemed like Miu’s way of looking at things.  She just went with the flow so easily. Saki stared at her food again.  It smelled good, but...

A dark hand reached over her plate, picked up one of the fried shrimp, and pushed it into her lips.  Saki spluttered, but as soon as her mouth opened, the food was pushed in. She grabbed hold of it with her teeth automatically.

Minato smirked at her as they sat on the other side of the table.

“What?  Not gonna eat?”

Saki spluttered, but she did push the shrimp back into her mouth and finished chewing it.

“What was that for??”

“You looked all depressed.  Nina dared me.”

“That was hilarious!! I didn’t think they’d actually do it!” Nina crowed, hopping into the seat next to Minato.  

Saki blushed.  Minato popped a shrimp into their mouth.

“What are you two going to do about the transfer?” Saki asked.

“I’m staying here.  My grades _sucked_!” Nina laughed.  “I couldn’t transfer up even if I wanted to.  And why would I want to?? I wanna stay with all of you guys.”

That made Saki feel actually a little warm in her stomach.  But it faded quickly.

“Minato?” she asked.

Minato shrugged.

“I qualified for Ra, but I dunno.  Don’t know if the long-term is worth it.”

“Thinking about the transfer, huh?”

They all looked up to see Ren standing over their table with his tray.  His usual pink flower clip was still pushed into his hair, tucking his bangs out of the way.

“Have people transferred out before?” Saki asked.

“Well, the graduates last year were the first ever class in the new Osiris program, so there haven’t been many opportunities,” Ren said.  “I don’t know if any of them transferred at second-year, because that’s when I started and I was at the other dorm. But none of them transferred third-year, and no one in my class ever has.”

Saki felt sick again.  She looked down at her plate.  Luckily, Ren didn’t say anything more, as Mostyn shouted at him to hurry up, and he walked over to another table.

Saki looked around at the rest of the room.  Chatter was starting to pick up again, slowly, and she saw all kinds of expressions.  Hanako looked almost pained with thought, and Saki remembered how she had come from a very prestigious middle school for dueling.  She was probably thinking hard about it too. Taro didn’t look bothered at all, and he was wolfing down his food. Anani and Taiki were talking in a low voice to each other.  Anani had taken on a bit of a green tinge like she did when she was feeling sort of sick. Both of them were great students too, so they probably had the option of going up. Anani might be thinking about how she’d have to hide herself again.

“Are you considering it?” Minato asked.

Their voice was pretty gentle, and Saki felt suddenly awful.  Because the truth was...she was. She was absolutely considering it.  She looked up at Minato, and Nina, and Miu.

“Can I tell you a secret?” she mumbled.

Minato and Nina exchanged a glance.  Nina crossed her chest with one hand and then held up three fingers in a scout’s honor promise.

“I’ll keep it for sure,” she said.

“Go ahead,” Minato said.

Miu yawned.  Saki squirmed in her seat for a moment.

“My parents are really mad at me for being in Osiris,” she said finally.  “Like, really, really mad.”

Minato’s eyes narrowed, and Nina frowned.

“Shouldn’t parents just be supportive?” she said.

“Not all of them are,” said Minato.

“I’ve always been at the top of my class in everything.  That was the only time they were ever happy with me,” Saki said, shifting in her seat.  “They were....super mad. All last year, every time I went home for break, kept wanting to know why I hadn’t gotten my act together and gotten into Blue.”

This was the simple, bland version of the story, but she felt horrible for telling even this.  She had to stop herself from looking over her shoulder, as though somehow her parents would be here to yell at her for telling someone outside the family about family matters.

Minato reached their hand across the table and put it on top of Saki’s.

“Saki, if you want to transfer, no one will be mad at you,” they said.  “You have to do what’s best for you.”

Saki blinked back sudden tears.

“All right,” she mumbled.  “I guess I’ll think about it.”

* * *

Saki’s dreams were difficult.  She was tangled up in the shadows of her bedroom at home, trying to hide the toys she was supposed to throw away under her bed, but she couldn’t get her hands out of the shadows and she couldn’t reach for them.  There were other, twisty things that she couldn’t quite remember when she woke up, and she burst up and out of them with a gasp, drenched in sweat.

She sat up, pushing her hair out of her eyes.  What time was it?

It was still dark in the room, and she could hear Miu snoring.  Angel was curled up in a ball by her feet. His head lifted when she moved, dark eyes glittering from the light of her alarm clock.

Saki rubbed the heels of her palms into her eyes.  She felt Angel’s paws getting up on her knees, and then his nose poking at her hands.

“It’s okay,” she whispered.  “I’m okay.”

She put her hands down, and began to pet Angel absently.  He purred, arching his body into her hand, and then curling up on her lap.

“What do you think I should do, Angel?”

Angel just huffed and snuggled deeper into her.  She kept petting him, staring into the dark. It occurred to her, that if she transferred to Obelisk, she...she probably wouldn’t be able to talk to Angel out loud like this.  She’d be back to hiding herself. Pretending she was something she wasn’t, like she had for her entire life. Hiding a whole part of herself so that she wouldn’t draw attention.  She’d almost forgotten how hard that was.

Her pager lay on her nightstand, the black screen almost staring at her.

“I was really excited to come back,” Saki said.  “You know? I was so happy to come back, and see everyone, and...”

More tears bubbled to her eyes.

“I should transfer, right?” she said.  “It will get mom and dad off my back. They’ll finally be happy.”

 _“You have to do what’s best for you,”_ Minato had said.  She rubbed her eyes.  She should do what her parents wanted.  That was always easiest.

Not ‘best’ though, was it?  Minato had said ‘best for _you_.’  What was best for her?

“Angel, was I happy before Duel Academia?” she asked.  “Do you remember?”

Angel lifted his head, and stared at her with his big black eyes.  Then he sat up, and rubbed his face against hers. He never talked, at least, not in a language she understood, but she almost felt like she understood the message.

 _I’m happy here_ , she thought.   _Happier than I’ve ever been before.  I can be me. I can feel safe. I can learn more about myself with people I love.  Even if I come back just for the classes...I’ll have to be hiding for the biggest part of my life._

She rubbed her tears away.  But if she didn’t transfer...her parents would never, ever forgive her.  That didn’t make her happy, either.

Her hands tightened into her covers beside Angel.

 _I’ve tried to make mom and dad happy for my whole life, and they’ve never been satisfied_ , she thought.   _When is it my turn?_

* * *

The application form sat on her desk.  Saki looked at it, her bag slung over her shoulder.

“Are you going to leave, Sacchan?” Miu asked quietly.

She jumped.  She hadn’t realized that Miu was awake.  She was still tucked under the covers, looking up at Saki from her pillow.  Saki looked back down at the form.

She picked it up, and tore it half.

“Nah,” she said.  “I wouldn’t get to hang out with any of you guys as much if I did.”

Miu’s smile was surprisingly bright and clear; she usually looked so sleepy and distant.  But then she yawned, and it was over.

“Miu can’t get up,” she said.

“Ugh,” Saki said, rolling her eyes with a smile.  “No wonder you want me to stay — who’s going to get you out of bed every morning if not for me?”

It took them what felt like forever to get Miu out of bed and ready to go, and then, they were running to be on time for homeroom.  They bolted through the trees, ran down the trail, and burst out onto the beach.

“Hey, sleepyheads!  You’re just on time!”

Saki looked up.  Nina was waving, and...and Saki felt her heart swelling up.  Everyone was still here. Hanako smiled, Anani waved shyly, Taiki was still carrying his way too big bag that was almost going to tip him over.  Every single one of her classmates was still here.

“No one transferred?” she gasped.

“Nope,” Hanako said.  “What fun would those other dorms be, anyway?”

Saki grinned.

This year was going to be a good one after all.


	3. Enter, Destiny!  The New Teachers Join In!

“All right!  If the second- and third-years could get into their units, I’m sure you remember this from last year!  We’ll be sending the new first-years your way.”

Hanako quickly slid over to Lin.  They didn’t have their crutches today, and they were looking brighter and healthier than usual.  Their cheeks were almost glowing.

“Hanako-chan!  It’s good to see you,” they said, hugging her.

“I missed you,” Hanako said.  “How are you doing?”

“I’ve been having a lot of good health days in a row, so it’s been nice,” they said.  “Looking forward to being a senpai?”

“Oh, I hope we get a few more oracles,” Hanako said, suddenly anxious.  “I wonder what the new first years are like!”

The rest of their unit fell in around them, chattering.  Saki was wringing her hands nervously, and Miu looked sleepy as usual.  Jian and Reina were having a conversation, as far as it was possible to converse properly with Reina.  Jian seemed to get what Reina was trying to say every time she echoed, though, and they both laughed at something.  

Hanako felt warm and cozy — she was glad she had decided to stay in Osiris Red.  She’d even talked to her aunt about it on the phone last night. She’d always been a good student and wasn’t sure how to explain what Osiris meant to her without talking about her powers, but her aunt had told her to stay where she was if she was happy.   _ “Hun, high school is your time!  Stick with your friends and with the place that makes you feel like your heart’s all full!  Don’t worry about your grade — worst comes to worst, you can come work my tea shop when you graduate!” _

She smiled to herself while remembering, and then turned her attention back to the class.

“Okay, so, the units are in order one through four here,” Andersen-sensei called.  “I’m going to call off names and what unit you’re in, and then you can head over and meet your upperclassmen.”

He flipped his clipboard paper up so he could read his list.

“Hamasaki Kayoko, you’re in unit one.”

He tucked the clipboard under his arm and made some motions with his hands that made Hanako blink with curiosity.  Was that sign language? A dark skinned, chubby student with long, lavender hair in two pigtails moved out of the clump of first years then.  Andersen-sensei pointed towards Hanako’s group, and they walked over to them. They were a little shorter than Hanako, and they smiled as they joined the group.  Hanako smiled back, waving.

“Inoue Takako, unit two.”

A tiny girl just a hair taller than Miu popped out of the group, scurrying to where Andersen-sensei pointed.  She was pale and tiny, with short orangey-brown hair and glasses, and she immediately ducked her head upon Taiki’s greeting.

“Mylene Masson, unit two.”

A tall, broad shouldered student with dark skin and bright orange hair in two puffy pigtails strode after Takako.

“Matsushita Haruka, you’ll be in unit one.”

A surly looking girl with dark brown skin and dark purple air in a ponytail slouched over to Hanako’s group.  Saki squeaked out a hello, and Haruka just glared at her, looking away. Well she didn’t seem very friendly.

“Nah Mi-Gyeong, unit three.”

A red streak bolted out of the first-year clump.  Her red hair bounced in its ponytail, and her pale face was flushed with excitement.  As though it were a compulsion, she dabbed as she skidded to a stop. Nina let out a whoop of excitement — clearly, Nina had just found her new protege.

“Onaga Harue, you’ll be in unit one.”

A tall, sweet looking boy with dark skin and short cut aqua hair meandered over to Hanako’s group.  He raised a hand in greeting and gave a big smile.

“Takahashi Mikako —”

“Toitoi!  It’s Toitoi!”

The voice was almost a little squeaky as the girl in question threw her hand in the air.  She was short and lightly tanned, with dark blue hair twisted into two looped pigtails. Andersen-sensei nodded and made a note on his clipboard.

“Toitoi, then.  You’re in unit three.”

The girl hopped over to her group, moving as though she had springs in her legs, or as though gravity was less powerful on her.

“Ueda Keiko, you’re also in unit three.”

The girl was small and cute looking, with big blonde pigtails poking out on either side of her pale, freckled face.  Her jacket was too long for her hands, and she smiled sweetly as she hurried over to join the others.

That just left one girl, a tall, elegant looking figure with long blond hair that fell well past her waist, her pale hands clasped in front of her.

“And Diana Velis, you’re in unit four.”

“Yes!!” Taro shouted.  “Over here, over here!”

Diana smiled brightly, and walked over to meet her group.  She was so elegant that it was like somehow, she wasn’t even touching the floor.

“All right, now that everyone’s in your groups, let me introduce your teachers.  We have a few new staff members this year, too,” Yuki-sensei said. “So unit one, you’ll be with Johan Andersen.  But we have a new teacher here too, specifically for the oracle class. Everyone, this is Saiou Takuma.”

Hanako clapped her hands with a compulsive excitement.  A teacher just for them?? That was great! Last year, Andersen-sensei had only been able to help them so much, he was way better equipped to help the spirit seers.

Saiou-sensei was a gentle looking man, almost fragile.  He was so pale that his skin seemed nearly translucent, and his dark purple hair was in a thick braid over his shoulder, a shock of white combed back from his bangs.  He bowed to the whole class.

“Unit two, you’re with Dawn Grey, but she’s late again, so for now, you’ll be over here with us in unit one,” Andersen-sensei said.  He tucked his clipboard over his shoulder.

“Unit three, you’re with me and Hibiki Midori,” Judai said.  “And unit four, you’ll finally be getting your own unit teacher.  This is Misawa Tania. You might remember her from the assembly, as she’s also the Ra Yellow advisor.”

Hanako definitely remembered her.  She was a difficult person to forget: tall, bronzed, and very broad, with muscles that could probably lift a truck.  When she grinned, she definitely had fangs.

“She’s a duel spirit,” Saki whispered to the group.  “A tiger, I think.”

“Definitely a tiger,” Jian whispered back.

“All right.  That’s all we have for the full class, so let’s break up with your teachers.  Oracles, you’re welcome to split off with Saiou right away, since I’ll have to be taking care of two units total anyway,” Andersen-sensei said.

He repeated the sentence in what Hanako was now sure was sign language, and the lavender haired student watched him carefully, nodding.  Hanako edged over to them, tapping them on the shoulder. They turned around with a blink.

“Hamasaki-san?” she said.  “Is that you?”

They stared at her lips for a moment, and then smiled and nodded.

“Call me Kayoko,” they said in a voice just a hint too loud and with an accent that seemed somehow half from Okinawa.  “Oracle?”

They signed something with their hands, and Hanako assumed that meant oracle.  She smiled and nodded. Saiou-sensei was waiting off to the side, and waved them over.

“Only one new oracle?” Lin said.  “Well, I guess we’re the rare type.  I was the first one in the Osiris program.”

Kayoko blinked at them confusedly.

“Can you repeat that?” they said.  They tapped their ear. “Or look right at me, it’s easier if you look right at me so I can sorta read your lips.”

“Oh!  Sorry,” Lin said, turning to face Kayoko as they spoke.  “Nice to meet you! I’m Wen Lin.”

Kayoko grinned.

“Nice to meet you too!” they said, signing it as they said it.

“Ah, so you three are the oracles this year?”

Saiou had a very soft sort of voice, but he paired it with some clumsy looking sign language.  Kayoko brightened when they saw him signing.

“That’s us,” Lin said.  “We’ve never had a teacher before.”

“Prophecy is becoming slowly more common among people, but it’s one of the least likely powers to end up here, as it’s less connected to Duel Monsters at first glance,” said Saiou.  “Let me introduce myself, by the way. I’m Saiou Takuma.”

“Are you an oracle too?”

“Yes,” he said with a smile.  “My specialty lies in tarot reading, though my powers have waned somewhat since my youth.  They’ve only just begun to reemerge in the last few years or so.”

“That can happen?” Hanako said, straightening with shock.

He looked a little embarrassed, rubbing the back of his neck.

“I had some...extenuating circumstances that caused my powers to go into something of a dormancy period, to allow my body to recover,” he said.  “One thing that is rarely talked about is that divination is a physical ability, just like anything else. It drains you — and it can do so constantly, without even knowing you have it on.”

Hanako couldn’t help but lean in, fascinated.  She’d never gotten to talk to anyone who knew what they were doing with oracle powers. Lin had done their best to mentor Hanako, but they were both sort of fumbling along together rather than anyone being a real teacher.

“As a child, I unknowingly had my abilities turned on to full power constantly,” Saiou said.  “It drained my body, and it attracted...other things that fed on my powers, overextending myself even further.”

“ _ That _ can happen?” Kayoko said, mouth dropping open.

“It’s very rare, so please do not worry,” Saiou said.  “Besides, the being that once assaulted me was long dealt with.  It was only that after it’s hold on my was broken, my body automatically sealed away my powers, like plugging up a faucet to prevent running out of water. It took me some time to recover enough to use them again.”

Wow.  Hanako was going to need a while to soak all of this new information in.  This was going to be an amazing year!

“But enough about me,” Saiou said with a faint chuckle.  “Let me get a sense of where the three of you are. How do your abilities present themselves?”

“I’m a lithomancer,” Lin said.  “I can interpret the light that passes through gemstones to take readings of possible futures.”

“Andersen-sensei and Lin-senpai have told me mine seems to be clairsentience,” Hanako said.  “When someone touches me, I can sometimes find myself projected into another part of their life, either the past or the future, and I view the memory as though I’m there.”

Saiou nodded, clumsily translating into sign language for Kayoko, since they.  Kayoko let out a tiny giggle that made Hanako think that Saiou-sensei was probably doing only a passable job at it.  Saiou turned to Kayoko, then.

“And you?” he asked, still signing.

“I’m a palm reader!” Kayoko said, signing back.  “I can tell a lot about a person from their hands!”

“Oooh,”  Hanako breathed.  Kayoko turned to the other two and grinned.

“Want me to try you guys?” they said.

“Oh, that would be amazing!” Hanako said.  “I would love to see you work.”

Saiou nodded.

“A practice session might be a good way to start the class, so I have an idea of how far you all are.”

Kayoko looked back at Saiou, blinking, and Saiou repeated it in sign language.  They grinned and nodded. 

“You wanna try?” they asked Hanako.

“Absolutely!” she said.

She held her hand out towards Kayoko, who cupped her hand in both of their own.

The minute their hands touched, Hanako’s stomach lurched, her eyes blurred, and then she was somewhere else.

She felt heat crackling all around her, saw the flicker of flames that nearly blinded her from seeing anything else.  Smoke filled her nostrils and she gasped, stumbling back. She heard a shout, but the words echoed and clattered around the room and she couldn’t pick out the meaning.  She spun around. Where was it coming from? What was happening?

She saw Kayoko, then, eyes wide, arms hooked under the shoulders of a shorter girl — a girl that Hanako quickly realized was Akiara.  Kayoko was trying to pull her away from the fire, towards the stairs. Someone else was in front of them, but Hanako couldn’t tell who it was from behind.  They were the person shouting, waving their arms against the flames that licked all around the room — where was this? The room didn’t look like any place she recognized, and with it all caught fire, she couldn’t tell where it was.

There was someone standing  _ in _ the flames, where the shouting person was looking.  Hanako bit back a scream. But they weren’t on fire — they were standing in the flames as though a part of them, and it was so bright that she couldn’t tell who it was.  She could only tell one thing: they were wearing a long, dark blue coat...

Hanako blinked free of the vision, gasping at the sudden change in light.  She realized she was sitting on the ground, in the sand, and the sky was so bright that she winced.  Kayoko and Lin were hovering over her worriedly, and Saiou had his hand on her forehead to check her temperature.

“You were burning up,” he said, looking concerned.  “Did you have a vision?”

Kayoko kept signing something, but Hanako wasn’t sure what they were trying to say.  Hanako swallowed. The vision felt a little hard to grasp all of a sudden, like a dream she’d  just woken up from.

“Yeah,” she said.  “There was something on fire...?”

It was slipping away.  Dammit!

“Kayoko-san and Akiara-chan were there,” she said.  “I don’t...I’m forgetting the rest.”

She flushed.  What good was she as an oracle if she couldn’t even remember her visions!  Saiou simply smiled at her gently though.

“Don’t worry,” he said.  “What you saw was only a possibility.  And it takes practice to have perfect vision recall.  Don’t push yourself.”

Hanako nodded, still feeling awful.  It wasn’t so much that she couldn’t remember the vision...

It was that it made her feel so nervous.  Like something bad was going to happen.

_ I don’t think this is going to be a very peaceful year,  _ she thought.


	4. Right Where We Left You! - The Situation of the Sisters

Saki yelped as a pair of hands clamped down over her eyes from behind.  She tried to jump up from her seat, but her giggling assailant leaned on her shoulders.

“Guess who!”

Saki immediately stopped pawing at the hands.

“Saya-senpai??”

“Bingo!!  First try!”

The hands flew off of her eyes, and when she blinked her vision back, Nishimura Saya had plopped her butt on top of Saki’s desk.

“Saya!” Saki said, trying not to squeal but failing.

She leapt from her seat and hugged Saya so hard that they both nearly tumbled over the desks.

“Holy geez!  You’d think it’d been a while since we saw each other,” Saya said, laughing and ruffling Saki’s hair.

“You’re still here!  I didn’t know you’d still be at the school or not!” Saki said, finally popping back.

“And I didn’t know I was gonna have to search all over the Osiris Dorm for ya, just to find your nerdy butt still in an empty lecture hall,” Saya teased.

Saki blushed.

“I just think better here.  The dorm is so loud! And we keep finding things the third years left behind as pranks.  It’s a madhouse.”

“Ooh, don’t tell me.  Kotone’s trick toilet?”

“Yup.”

“Saito’s many, many pentagrams that’ll summon who knows what if you accidentally uncover one?”

“Yuup.”

“Maristella’s bathtub slime?”

Saki blinked at her.  Saya grinned.

“Oh. That one’s still a surprise.  Forget I said anything.”

Saki shuddered, wondering what exactly she might find in the bathtub this time.  Then she focused on the moment, grinning at Saya. She was about the same as ever: same round, rosy face, bright eyes, crooked glasses and matching grin, same dark hair in the same messy bun.  The only thing that was markedly different about her is that she wasn’t in her Osiris Red uniform anymore. Instead, she was wearing the loudest looking neon splattered jacket that Saki had ever seen, over a purple tank top and heavy brown cargo pants.

“How have you been?  I’m sorry I didn’t text you like I promised I would,” said Saki.

“Nah, you’re good, it’s been busy here too,” Saya said, waving a hand.  “Doing great, as usual! Thought it’s been a trip living at a school. It feels unnatural to live here over a break.”

She mock shuddered, and Saya laughed.

“How’s Hinata-san?” she said.  “Is she holding up?”

She hesitated when she saw the flicker of unease cross Saya’s face.

“She’s...hanging in there,” Saya said.  “Actually, that’s part of the reason why I wanted to track you down.  Most of it was because I wanted to see you, of course.”

She ruffled Saki’s hair again, and when Saki laughed and mock attempted to get away, she grabbed her in a light headlock and noogied her.  Saki felt winded when she finally squirmed free, giggling.

“I was wondering if you’d like to visit with my big sis,” Saya said.  “Judai says that seeing people in control environments is good for her recovery, and, you know, since I’ve told her that you’re the one who pretty much saved her, she’s been wanting to meet you.”

“I’d love to meet her for real!” Saki said, hopping up.  “I want to know where all of you came from.” 

Saya made a mock offended noise.

“Hey!  She’s my sister, not my mother!  And she learned more from me. Don’t let her tell you otherwise.”

Saya popped up from the desk and Saki rose to follow her, gathering up her books and stuffing them in her bag.  Saya led the way up the stairs and through the doors, out into the hallway. It was still surprisingly busy in the main building despite it being after classes.  There was a group of Ra Yellows clustered near a window playing Duel Monsters on the floor. Three Obelisk Blues sat on some low stools in a corner with a vending machine, arguing about something and thrusting their books in each other’s faces.  Another small group of Yellows and Blues were throwing a hacky sack around.

Saki glanced around, and realized with a start that there weren’t any Osiris Reds around.  None of the Yellows had a red jacket among them, and even the hacky sack players, where Saki could totally see Nina joining in, didn’t have a single Osiris student.  She felt suddenly hugely out of place with her own red jacket, even though it was currently tied around her waist.

She didn’t say anything to Saya, and Saya didn’t say anything about it either.  They just walked down the halls, passed the groups of students, and headed out into the cool spring evening.  Saya took them through the back of the school. Saki had never been behind the school before — the forest was right up against the school back here, and it felt nice and cool beneath the trees.  A rabbit scurried into a bush as they headed down the trail.

“You guys live back here?” Saki asked.

“Yeah, Johan-sensei set us up in the little house where the old card shop lady used to live.  She retired a few years back so it’s just been empty.”

Crickets started singing as they came up on the house.  It was definitely small, probably about the size of two first-year Osiris dorm rooms.  But it had that charming old lady look, with white walls and dark brown trim, and a pot of flowers in the window sill.  The window was open, and Saki could see curtains rippling from the breeze. Saya opened the door and bowed to Saki so that she could go in.  Saki giggled.

“Hey, neechan!” Saya called, as Saki paused in the door to take off her shoes.  “I brought Saki over. You awake?”

There was a faint knocking sound from the next room over.  Saya closed the door and took off her shoes, too, and then led Saki from the entryway and into the door on the left.

It had been only a few weeks overall since Saki had seen Nishimura Hinata, but Saki could definitely tell that despite that, she didn’t look much better.  Hinata sat on a small couch opposite the door, her long auburn brown hair cascading down over its back and pooling around her. She was staring at the ceiling, her skin looking pale and a little bit gaunt, hollow cheeked as though she hadn’t been eating well.  Her eyes looked sunken, and her clothes seemed to hang on her somehow.

From behind Saki’s legs, Angel peeked out.  He let out a tiny meowing sound, and padded over to Hinata, rubbing against her legs even though she couldn’t see or feel him.

“Hey,” Saya said softly.  “Hina-nee?”

That seemed to stir Hinata, and she blinked, letting her head back down to its normal height.  Saya smiled gently.

“Hey, neechan,” Saya said.  “Saki’s here. You feel okay?”

Hinata blinked.  She had very clear, pretty hazel eyes, despite her hollow look.  A smile broke over her features, and it seemed to shine away the sharp edges of her vaguely ill look.

“Oh?  This is Saki-chan?” Hinata said.  “Oh, sorry...is it okay to call you Saki-chan?  Saya’s told me a lot about you.”

“That’s totally fine!” Saki said.

“You can call me Hinata then,” Hinata said with another smile — it had just a hint of the mischief that was always in Saya’s grins, and Saki could definitely see the resemblance. 

Saya pulled up a couple of chairs, and they sat down near Hinata.  Angel hopped up onto the couch beside Hinata, curling up pressed up against her.  Saki couldn’t help but smile.

“Sorry about not getting up,” Hinata said, smiling apologetically. “I’m feeling a little extra squishy today.”

“That’s okay,” Saki said.  “I’m sure you...need time to rest.”

She hurriedly skipped over accidentally mentioning something about the incident that had imprisoned her away from home for years.  She didn’t want to start this visit off by triggering Hinata or anything.

“How are you feeling today, neechan?” Saya asked, leaning her elbows down on her knees.

“Blegh.  Like usual,” Hinata said, rolling her eyes.  “I didn’t throw up my toast though, so yay! Progress!”

She flashed Saki a sarcastic peace sign, and Saki wasn’t sure if she was supposed to laugh or not.  Hinata sighed, smiling.

“Hey,” she said, leaning forward with her elbows on her knees, like Saya.  “I don’t want you to think you’ve gotta walk on eggshells around me. I know that I come off as pretty fragile right now, but I’m gonna get better.  I just want a chance to live a little, ya know?”

She was a lot like Saya.  The resemblance was almost uncanny.  Even though Hinata  _ must  _ be older than Judai or Johan, as she disappeared a year before Saki’s teachers had even come to school, she looked like she wasn’t much older than Saya.  They could almost be twins.

“I can understand that,” Saki said, blushing.  “I guess it’s rough, right?”

Hinata let out a laugh that turned into a couple racking coughs.  Saya stood up as though to help, but Hinata waved her off. She coughed one last time, and gave them a wry smile.

“Yeah,” she said.  “But that’s putting it a little mildly.”

She smiled brighter then, though, and Saki was struck again by how much she looked like Saya.  

“But enough about my depressing state of affairs!  I wanted to meet you, Saki-chan, and get to know you a little bit better.  You’re a second year, right?”

“Oh, yes!”

“Saya’s told me a lot about you.  You’re good at school?”

Saki blushed.

“I’ll bet she said I was a nerd.”

“It’s true!” Saya said.  “You are!”

Hinata crossed her eyes with a grin at Saya.

“A little bird told me that you were the top student in your graduating class,” she teased Saya.  “So who’s the nerd now?”

“I only did that cause I wanted to stick it to the Blues!”

“Hey, hey, I was a Blue,” Hinata said with a wink.  “Anyway, Saki-chan, fill me in! What deck do you use? Introduce me to your monsters!”

Saki brightened, and dug in her pocket for her cards.

“Angel seems to like you already,” she said.  “Sorry, if I was a psychic duelist, I could let you see him.”

“Oh, is that what I’m feeling right here?” Hinata said.

She pawed her hand through the space where Angel was, but her hand passed through him.  He yawned, and snuggled up next to her closer. Saki had to giggle.

“He really likes you.”

“I can sort of feel the fuzz of his fur, but I can’t see him,” Hinata said.  “I didn’t have any real developed powers back before, but I could always get this little static sense when there was a spirit around.  I still have a bit of it.”

“Don’t push it,” Saya said in a warning sort of voice, and Hinata rolled her eyes.

“Yes, mother,” she said.

“This is what Angel looks like,” Saki said, turning her deck to face Hinata.  

Hinata let out a low  _ awwww _ as she took the card.

“Oh, you’re a handsome boy, aren’t you!” she spoke towards the space where Angel was.

Angel yawned, and put his hand on her leg, looking very pleased with himself.

“You’re going to make his ego even bigger,” Saki laughed.

“He deserves every bit of that ego,” Hinata cooed.  She took Saki’s cards gently, and rifled through them.  She was very careful with them, almost reverent, and Saki didn’t feel the least bit worried about her cards in Hinata’s hands.  “This is a great deck, Saki-chan. I understand why you gave Saya a run for her money.”

She handed the cards back, and Saki tucked them back into their box.

“Let me show you mine,” Hinata said, reaching over the arm of the couch to the small table beside it.

“Do you have big monsters like Saya?”

“My monsters are so much cooler than Saya’s,” Hinata said.

“That’s a big fat lie and you know it.  My Kaiju are so much cooler!”

“Well my precious baby Worms are cuter, so there!”

Saya made a gagging sound, pretending to throttle herself for Saki.  Saki smothered her giggle behind her hand.

Hinata fumbled to pull the drawer of the table open, and pulled a thin stack of cards out of it.  She was turning back to face the two of them when suddenly, her skin seemed to turn a twinge paler.

The cards slid out of her grip and splattered to the floor.  Saki immediately leaped to her feet.

“Oh, I’ll get them!”

She dropped down to start gathering up the cards.  But then, Hinata made a very awful sound. Saki wasn’t sure how to classify it — it was somewhere between a scream, a choke, and a rattle that a human throat shouldn’t be able to make.

Saya exploded to her feet, leaping over Saki on the floor and taking her sister by the shoulders.  Angel quickly leaped up and off the couch. He paced at the bottom of the couch, back arched and hackles bristling, looking horribly agitated. 

Saki grabbed up the last of the cards and shot back up, clutching them to her chest.  Saya carefully laid her suddenly shaking sister down on the couch and grabbed both her hands.  Hinata’s eyes were wide, her mouth hanging open, and she let out another one of those awful scream-choke-rattle sounds.

“Hey, hey, hey, hey,” Saya whispered over and over.  “I’m right here, I’m right here. You’re safe. You’re safe.”

“Watching,” Hinata gasped.  “It’s still watching! It’s still watching!”

“Hina-nee, it’s okay, it’s okay, I’m right here, it’s okay.  Do you want me to call Johan?”

Hinata’s eyes were so wide, and her body spasmed slightly, but with Saya gripping her hands, she couldn’t seem to flail the way she wanted to.  Her legs kicked feebly.

“It’s still watching me, it’s always watching, it has eyes everywhere, it’s still here it’s still here it’s still here it won’t let me go —”

“Hina-nee, Hina-nee, Hina-nee,” Saya whispered over and over, her voice breaking with a thin panic.

_ I should call Andersen-sensei, _ Saki thought, but she couldn’t move.  There was a horrible pressure in her chest, and she couldn’t stop shaking.  She couldn’t rip her eyes away from the trembling, panicking Hinata. She could hardly breathe herself — and Angel wasn’t helping matters.  He kept arching his back, twisting and hissing at the corners of the room with no real sense of pattern. Was he seeing something that Hinata was seeing, too, or was he just reacting to her panic?

Slowly, slowly, the attack passed.  Hinata’s trembles slowed, and her babbling faded to mumbles.  Her eyes fluttered. For a moment, Saki’s chest seized. But then she realized that Hinata’s chest was still rising and falling, and that she had simply fallen into an exhausted sleep.

Saya looked just as exhausted when she finally stood up shakily, gently laying her sister’s hands back down.

“Is she okay?” Saki whispered.

“I don’t know,” Saya said.  For the first time since Saki had known her, Saya sounded truly, utterly exhausted.  Not a spark of her usual excited mischief remained in her voice. She simply sounded old.

Saki hesitated, and then gently put a hand on Saya’s arm.  Saya put her own hand on top of Saki’s, squeezing it lightly.

“Sorry you had to see that,” she said.  “She’s been doing better. They’ve been coming less frequently.”

“No, it’s okay.” Saki said.  “I know it...it has to be hard.  She was gone for so long.”

Saya took off her glasses and ran a hand down her face. Saki kept her hand on Saya’s arm, feeling lost.  She didn’t know what to say or do. She’d never seen Saya look so sad and grave.

“Um...if it’s too much for me to ask, don’t answer, but...do you know what’s wrong?” she asked.

Saya shook her head.

“Johan and Judai aren’t really sure either,” she said.  “We know that Hinata was in Dark World back when Judai was...you know.”

She shrugged helplessly.  Saki nodded. She did know.

“But it seems like she simply up and vanished sometime after that.  It looks like she was kept in some kind of bubble, pocket dimension for a really long time.  It’s why she hasn’t aged.”

_ Oh _ , Saki thought.   _ So it’s not just me, thinking she looks about the same age as Saya. _

“Johan thinks she was basically asleep for most of that, and Hinata doesn’t remember much, but...sometimes that happens.”

She shrugged again, towards Hinata’s general direction.  Saki nodded.

“It’s normal to have reactions like that after a traumatic incident,” she said, aware that she sounded like she was parroting a textbook.

Saya nodded.  She stared at nothing for a bit.  Then she turned to face Saki, and she looked so pale and sad.

“Do you mind if I just talk about it a little sometimes?” she said.  “I mean — I know that’s probably a lot. You’ll want to just be able to focus on your second-year and all.  But...”

“That’s not a problem!” Saki said immediately.  “We’re friends, Saya-senpai. I want to be there for you.  And for Hinata-san!”

Saya smiled, and it was a tremulous, weak looking thing, but still with the same old Saya charm.  She quickly wiped a tear from her eye, chuckling.

“I’ve been graduated only for a year and I already feel like I’m getting old,” she said.  “Come on. It’s late, and dark out. I’ll walk you back to your dorm.”

“What about Hinata-san?” Saki asked, looking quickly over at the sleeping woman. 

“Judai and Johan have their Heroes and Crystal Beasts in the forest and around the house.  She’ll be safe til I get back.”

Saki nodded.  She carefully put Hinata’s cards back down on the table, and bowed in her direction.  Saya led her to the door, and they got their shoes back on.

“You’re welcome to keep visiting, too,” Saya said.  “I mean, if you have time. And it’s not too much trouble.  And if —”

“Saya-senpai,” Saki said, smiling.  “I’ll definitely come back to visit.”

She hesitated, and then reached for Saya’s hand, squeezing it.

“I’m really glad to see you again,” she said.  “Graduation was hard, saying goodbye.”

Saya quirked another, much brighter smile at her.  She took her hand back and ruffled Saki’s hair.

“I’m glad to see you again too, squirt,” she said as Saki giggled from the ticklish feeling.  “Now let’s get you back in your dorm before Judai yells at me for keeping you out after curfew.”


	5. The Weight of Obelisk - A Bad Start to the Year After All?!

“Eh??  Hinata-san is doing that badly?”

Saki shushed Nina, looking around to see if anyone was listening.  The campus was scattered with students, sitting on the grass doing homework, chasing each other around the big stone decor that lined the path to the school, walking back towards their classes, but other than that, no one was close enough to be listening.

“What?  Is it a secret that she’s here?” Nina asked, blinking.

“No, but I don’t want people to bother her and Saya-senpai,” Saki said.  “It doesn’t need to be something the whole school knows about, you know.”

“Well, everyone kind of saw you pull her out of thin air last year,” Minato pointed out.

Saki groaned softly.  She was trying to forget about that.  Luckily, no one seemed to have brought it up, and she really didn’t know what the school’s official word on what that had all been about was...but she was sure Judai and Johan and the other teachers had done their best to cover up what needed to be covered up, for their own privacy.

“Still.  She’s fragile and recovering, and she needs some space,” Saki said.  

She reached over the blanket they’d spread out on the grass to grab one of the mini sandwiches that Miu had brought.  Miu was sleepily nibbling on a rice ball, looking at nothing in particular as though she were sleeping with her eyes open.  Taro laid on his stomach with his head on his hands, panting softly. He’d left his jacket in a pile beside him, and his ears were tucked back into his hair.  It always looked a little weird to see him without his ears and tail, but in public he didn’t like it when people stared at him. Nina offered him a sandwich, and he took it out of his fingers with his mouth like a dog.  Minato rolled their eyes.

“Is it okay for us to visit?” she asked suddenly.  “Miu would like to see how Hinata-san is doing, too.”

“Saya-senpai said we could come by whenever, as long as we let her know first,” Saki said.  “She’s still on our pagers.”

“Oh, cool,” Minato said, opening up their pager to check that it was true.  “Oh, speaking of which. Have any of you guys talked to any of the new first-years yet?”

“I have!!” Nina said, popping straight up.  “You guys have got to meet Mi-Gyeong-chan! She’s literally so cool!”

“Nina, I was standing right next to you while the two of you talked at one hundred miles a minute, I know,” Minato said, rolling their eyes. 

“Well, then why did you ask??”

“I was more asking the people  _ not  _ in our unit,” Minato said.  “And I don’t know. I’m just curious, I guess.  This is the first year where we’re not the new kids, and...I dunno.  I don’t know how to be a senpai.”

Saki sat back on her hands, thinking about it.

“I guess I really haven’t had a chance to introduce myself much,” she said.  “I tried to say hello to the new spirit seer but she kinda...just scowled at me.”

Saki hadn’t really thought about it much since her thoughts had been tangled up with Hinata and Saya, but now that she had the chance to mull it over...  She shifted uncomfortably.

“Maybe we could be doing better, yeah,” she admitted.  “I don’t know how to be a good role model either.”

Minato shifted their knees up in front of them, leaning forward and resting their elbows and chin across them.

“I don’t know.  I guess I just keep thinking about...this time last year I was just mad at the whole world.  Being in Osiris had felt like a slap in the face at first, and even after I learned the truth...I didn’t feel like I belonged here.  I didn’t think anyone really got what was I going through with my powers.”

They sighed, letting their face fall into the space between their knees.

“But because of all of you guys, I felt better,” they said.  “So...I wonder if any of the new kids are feeling the same way.  If they’re feeling lost and isolated. I mean...Osiris is great, but even so, there’s this...feeling of disconnect from the rest of the school.  The rest of the students. Does that make sense.”

Miu stopped nibbling her rice ball, hands resting in her lap and cradling the unfinished food.  Taro ran a hand through his hair, over where his ears would normally be, looking a little said. Even Nina’s smile sagged a little, and she stared up at the sky.

Saki remembered the other day, walking through the halls of Duel Academia, and seeing all of the students from the other dorms.  But not a single red jacket in sight...how much it had made her feel like she stood out.

Duel Academia was home.  Osiris Dorm was home. And Saki had friends outside of Osiris...well, okay, one friend.  But...Minato was right.

It still didn’t really feel like they belonged.

“Hey!  What’s going on over there?” Nina said suddenly, shooting to her feet.

Saki and the others all looked up.  Taro scrambled up to his knees.

On the other side of the path leading to the school, there was a small cluster of students in blue coats.  Obelisks, probably second years based the style of the jackets. Two of them were laughing, and one in the middle stepped forward, closer to...ah!  That was someone in a red jacket!

Angel hissed, and Saki leaped to her feet with a burning sense of dread.  She saw one of the cluster reach out and shove, and the person in the red jacket stumbled.

Saki’s whole group leaped up at once.  Taro was by far the fastest, his long legs and stronger body pushing him across the space in half a second.  He let out a very dog-like snarl, grabbing one of the Obelisk students and pulling them back by the shoulders.  They swore at him, but then instantly went white at the look on his face. By the time Saki and the others caught up, the other Obelisk students were backing up.

“Hey!” Minato shouted.  “What’s the big idea? What’s going on here?”

One of the Obelisk students hadn’t moved from her spot in front of the Osiris student.  Saki recognized the Osiris student, now — it was the new spirit seer in her own unit, a first-year.  Matsushita Haruka, Saki remembered: the girl was a little shorter than Saki, with bushy dark purple hair and skin a little darker brown than Minato’s.  

Saki quickly pushed herself in between Haruka and the other Obelisk girl, hoping that getting in between might at least disrupt the tension.

The Obelisk girl glared down at her.  She was a good three inches taller than Saki, with pale skin and cutting gray eyes.  Her dark blue hair had been piled into a neat side ponytail that curled slightly at the ends, and she looked down her nose at Saki, arms folded over the front of her blue jacket.

“Okay, that’s it, show’s over, everyone go home,” Minato said, walking in to stand near Saki and add another red jacket in between the blue.

“Yeah!  Ganging up on people is super uncool!” Nina shouted.

The Obelisk girl’s lips curled, wrinkled the whole of her aristocratic face.

“We weren’t ganging up,” she said, sniffing.  “We just thought Osiris could take care of itself, without back up.”

Saki stared at her, not sure if she should be surprised or not.  It sounded like...this girl actually considered Osiris to be a legitimate class, instead of acting like they were subpar students.

The illusion broke quickly.

“After all, somehow, Osiris students were our top scorers last year,” the girl said, lips curling further as her eyes bored into Saki specifically.

Saki felt her stomach seize up.  A faint tremble jumped to her fingers, and she curled them into fists to hide it.  Oh...oh all of them were staring at  _ her _ now.

“Shove off,” Minato snapped.  “If you’re so upset about it, then work harder!”

The girl looked like she smelled something awful.  She didn’t even look at Minato, or any of the others.  She was too busy glaring down Saki. 

Saki had, briefly, faced down an evil demigod creature that had made itself look like an evil version of her teacher last year.  Somehow, this was the glare that was way more scary. She seized up again, feeling a tremor of panic course through her.

The girl leaned down, then, so that her face was inches from Saki.  Saki didn’t dare flinch away, though she did push Angel back with her foot before he could bite her.

“I’m not buying it,” the girl hissed at Saki.  “I’m not buying that  _ you _ were our representative last year.  You should have been in Obelisk if that were the case — but look at you.  Still in that repulsive red jacket.”

“There’s nothing wrong with our jackets!” Taro shouted.  

He grabbed the girl by the shoulder and pulled her away from Saki, and Saki could tell that it was taking everything that he had not to start growling.  His hair ruffled with the ears that he wanted to let out.

“Now you leave us alone!” Taro said.  “We didn’t do anything to you!”

The girl smacked his hand off of her shoulder, nose wrinkling.  Her eyes flickered to Saki one more time with a horrible, angry look.  Then she turned on her heel.

“Whatever,” she said.  “Don’t think that things are going to be such smooth sailing for you all this year, drop outs.”

She stalked away, and one at a time, with varying expressions of anger and almost evil looking grins, the rest of them dispersed off in her direction.

Saki and the others stood very quietly for a few moments.  Then Saki let out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding.  

“Hey, are you okay?” she said, turning to Haruka.

She was surprised to see that Haruka was glaring at her with almost as much venom as the Obelisk girl had.  It was so shocking that she startled back slightly.

“I didn’t ask for your help,” Haruka snapped.

Saki could only stare, open-mouthed.  Then Minata bristled.

“That’s no way to talk,” they said.  “We were just trying to help! Osiris sticks together.”

“Yeah, well I didn’t ask to be an Osiris,” Haruka said.  “And I didn’t ask for you to ‘stick with me’ either.”

She scowled at all of them, stuffing her hands into the pockets of her skirt.

“But...but Osiris is a place where we can be real,” Taro said, sounding small for the first time since the encounter with Obelisk.  “Why wouldn’t you want to be yourself for once?”

“I’m not like the rest of you.  Now leave me the fuck alone.”

She turned and began to storm off.  But she hesitated, looking back over her shoulder.  Her eyes flickered down to the ground, where Angel and Mewfeiulle were sitting.  Her lips curled.

“You think this is some kind of game or something?” she said.  “A magic place where we can all be friends? Don’t make me laugh.”

She spat on the ground.

“We’re all just freaks,” she said.  “And no matter what little bubble you make up, no matter how you dress up our little isolated dorm, everyone’s always going to see us that way.”

She turned away for real that time, and stalked out of earshot.

The silence that drifted over their group was solemn and heavy.  Saki felt like there were two huge weights dragging her shoulders down, crunching her into the ground.  The Obelisks had been bad enough. But to hear that from one of the Osiris students? She couldn’t stop thinking about seeing all the groups of kids all over the school, scattered clumps of yellow and blue all together — and red, all by itself.

_ We’re all just freaks.  And everyone’s always going to see us that way. _

She felt Miu slip her hand into hers, very quietly.

“She’s wrong,” Miu whispered.

Saki nodded, but she was suddenly very, very far away.


	6. Bring It In! - Let’s Have a Welcome Party!!

“I still think the abandoned dorm would have been more fun,” said Eun.

“More fun,” Reina agreed.

“Absolutely not,” Ren said.  “Now stop throwing grass into the fire, or Yuki-sensei will scold us.”

Eun stuck her tongue out at Ren, but she moved back from the bonfire. 

Against the darkening sky, the fire licked towards the stars.  It was almost taller than Minato, it was so big already. And the night had really just begun, too.  They fiddled with the bags of marshmallows, setting them out in rows with the other smores materials.

“Nina!  Stop eating all the marshmallows!” they said, smacking her hand which had been sneaking towards an already open bag.

“I can’t help it!  The sugar is calling my name!” Nina whined.

Saki let out a hup as she dumped the pile of sharpened sticks on the table with the rest of the stuff.

“Is this enough?” she said, looking worried.  “I hope we have enough!”

“We can always take turns.  It’ll work out, calm down, Saki,” Minato said.

Saki wrung her hands nervously, looking around the clearing.

They’d gotten permission from Yuki-sensei and Andersen-sensei to host a bonfire party in front of the underclassmen dorm.  There was enough open space, and building a pit had only taken a few minutes with Yuki-sensei’s powers. Saki had been the one to suggest it, and Minato suspected it had something to do with her wanting to reach out to the underclassmen after what had happened with Haruka.  That girl. She wanted to be liked so badly, and she thought she had to take care of everyone.

Well, one way or another, maybe it would be fun, Minato thought, smacking Nina away from the marshmallows again.  Things had definitely seemed a lot more tense to start off this year. And it was better than Saya’s ‘traditional stay at the abandoned dorm.’  Yuki-sensei was  _ extra _ adamant about them staying away from there this year — he insisted that while it was technically safe magically, it was old and crumbling and structurally unstable, and they were finally going to be tearing it down soon anyway.

Speaking of Saya, the girl appeared from nowhere, reaching over Minato’s shoulders to grab a marshmallow and popping it into her mouth.

“Yo yo!” she said through a mouthful of sticky fluff.  “Where’s the party at?”

“Saya-senpai!  You came!” Saki said, brightening.  “Oh, but what about Hinata-san?”

“She’s good.  Wanted to sleep.  She hasn’t had an attack since you came by last.  Dawn-sensei is hanging out with her in case anything goes wrong, but they both pretty much kicked me out.”

Saya snuck another marshmallow before Minato could stop her, grabbing two in a fist and passing one to Nina, and then the two of them bolted for the fire.  Minato rolled their eyes.

“At least eat some of the hot dogs first,” they said, shaking the bag at them.  “Oy! Everyone come get some sticks and food before it disappears!”

Mostyn ambled over first, grabbing a stick with his hand that had turned into a giant black tentacle.  A couple people made a retching noise when he wrapped the slimy appendage around the stick, and he grinned, clearly gunning for that reaction.  He passed the stick to Anani behind him, and she giggled as she tried to avoid touching the tentacle. A small torrent of people clustered around the table as everyone tried to grab a stick and get away with at least one or two marshmallows.

“Where are all the first-years?” Saki said, looking up at the dorm nervously.  “I hope they got the invitations.”

“I’m here, at least,” said a cute, high-pitched voice.

Minato jumped.  They hadn’t noticed the tiny girl come up beside them.  She was shorter than Minato by a significant margin, probably about Miu’s height or maybe even shorter.  She had a very round, childish face, and big shiny hazel eyes. Her bright blond hair was lighter than her fair skin, and put up into two big pigtails that stuck out on either side of her head.  She had to shake her sleeves back so that she could get her hands free, grabbing a stick and three marshmallows. Minato recognized her; she was a new Shadow Gamer in their own unit.

“Oh, hey,” Minato said.  “Didn’t see you there. Ueda-san, right?”

“Call me Keiko!” the girl giggled.  “And you’re Minato-oniisan, right?”

Minato bit their lip, twinging a bit irritably at the gendered term.  Not to mention... _ oniisan _ ?  What was she, some kind of anime character?

“Just Minato is fine,” they said.  “I’m not a fan of uh...that kind of term for me.”

Keiko tilted her head at them, looking adorably confused.  But then she just smiled.

“Okay!  Minato!”

She smiled and skipped off to the bonfire with her stick of marshmallows.

“Well, at least one of them seems friendly,” Minato said to Saki.

“Yo, hey, is this where we get the food??”

Minato looked up quickly to see the next two people at the table.  They recognized the one, but not the other. The first was a girl about Minato’s height, with fair skin and short dark blue hair that flipped out at the edges.  She wore heavy brown pants and a black tank top, showing off finely toned arm muscles. The other was taller than her, dark skinned, with a rumpled half open dress shirt and short-shorts, and bright orange hair pulled into round, puffy pigtails.

“Oh, yeah, of course,” Minato said.  “You’re...Toitoi, right?”

“You said it right!” the dark-haired girl said, brightening.  “Minato-senpai, yeah? Didn’t get a huge chance to say hello to you earlier.”

She stuck her hand out across the table, and Minato awkwardly shook.  They remembered that she was a shadow gamer, too, from their unit as well. 

“I’m Mylene,” said the other.  “Oh — xe and xir pronouns, by the way.  Hate to start the convo like that, but it streamlines things, ya know?”

“Oh, for sure,” Minato said, smiling.  “They and them pronouns for me.”

Mylene’s eyes brightened, and xe also shook Minato’s hand.  Toitoi had already loaded up a stick with four marshmallows and a hot dog all at once.  She grabbed one to pop into her mouth and made an “ummm” sound.

“ _ Hinna, hinna _ ,” she said appreciatively.  “Oy, Takako! Get over here and get a hot dog!  You’re too skinny!”

The girl she was addressing jumped almost a foot in the air.  She’d been approaching very slowly, and looked like she might bolt.  She reminded Minato a bit of Akiara, though she was much skinnier, with short orangey-brown hair in a neat bob and glasses perched on a small nose.  Before she could bolt, however, Toitoi had run over and slung an arm over her shoulder, hurrying her over to the table.

“I — um — I’m vegetarian,” the girl managed to breathe before Toitoi could shove a hot dog at her.

“What a waste,” Toitoi groaned.

“Don’t worry, so is Lindbloom,” Minato said.  “We’ve got a couple of veggie dogs.”

Takako looked like she was about to cry, either from exertion or relief, Minato couldn’t be sure.  Toitoi was still hanging over her shoulders, so Minato popped a veggie dog onto a stick and passed it to Takako.

“All three of us are in the same room,” Mylene said.  “It’s a party.”

“Three people to a room?” Saki said, eyes widening.  “That must be a tight squeeze...”

“They knocked out a wall between two rooms to fit us,” Toitoi said.  “Andersen-sensei said he didn’t want anyone to have to be alone for their first year, at least.”

“As long as we don’t scare Takako-chan too much this year and she wants to see the back of us,” Mylene said with a laugh.

Takako flushed and mumbled something that no one could hear.

“How are you guys feeling about Osiris so far?” Saki asked, sounding nervous.

“I love it!” Toitoi said, stabbing her fork into the air.  “Secret societies? Magic stuff? And I’m a part of it? Heck yeah!”

“Honestly, it’s a relief,” Mylene said.  Xe adjusted the lay of xir dress shirt. “You know?  Having a bunch of other people to share this with for once is like learning how to breathe again.”

Minato snuck a glance at Saki, and was pleased to see that her face was shining with a big old smile once again.

“I’m so glad,” she said, her breath rushing out of her all at once.  “I mean — Osiris was the same for me! So I’m...really glad that you guys like it here.”

“For sure!” Toitoi said, saluting.  “Anyway, if you’ll excuse us, senpai, these hot dogs need a torching!”

Saki waved as the three first-years headed back over to the bonfire.  There were copses of students all over the place, chattering, setting their marshmallows on fire, throwing things at each other, laughing.  Minato looked at Saki again, and was happy to see that she was still smiling.

“Well?  Success?” they asked.

Saki blushed.

“Sorry.  I got worked up again.”

Minato patted her on the shoulder.

“You just wanted to be here for people.  There’s nothing wrong with that.”

Saki blushed again, but she smiled.

“Thanks,” she said.  “You know, Minato? I’m really glad we’re friends.”

It was Minato’s turn to feel a blush coming on.  They quickly rubbed their hand over their cheeks, glad that it was dark out.

“This time last year, I was kind of scared of you,” Saki said.

Minato rolled their eyes, but they couldn’t help but smile.

“I was pretty scary,” they said, crossing their eyes at Saki.  “But I was mostly just a dick.”

“No, you had a right to be prickly with me,” Saki said.  She pushed her hair back behind her ears. “But I’m...really glad that we’re friends now.  Because it’s really easy to talk with you now.”

Minato looked down at the table.  They weren’t sure what they could say to that.  So they grabbed a marshmallow and threw it at Saki.  It bounced off of her face and she squeaked, trying to catch it.  It fell to the ground despite her efforts.

“Hey!  I was trying to say something nice!” she said indignantly.

“I’m bad at nice,” Minato said, snickering. “Get a hot dog before they run out, you sap.”

Saki stuck out her tongue, but she grabbed the last stick.

“I guess you and I will have to take turns with it,” she said.  “Or I’ll make two hot dogs. How do you like yours cooked?”

“Crunchy.”

“Ewww, you’re one of those.  You set your marshmallows on fire too, don’t you?”

“Only way to eat marshmallows!”

Minato followed Saki over to the bonfire as they talked.  There were a few other first years over there that they hadn’t officially met yet, and Minato smiled and nodded at one tall, dark boy with aqua hair, who smiled kindly back.  They didn’t see any sign of Haruka, though, Minato thought. Maybe she hadn’t come. Maybe she was an outlier — the rest of the first-years seemed pretty friendly.

_ We’re all freaks and that’s all anyone is going to see us as. _

“Oy!  There she is!”

Saki yelped, almost dropping the hot dogs as Kaede tackled her, wrapping her arms around Saki’s neck and almost taking them both down.

“Kaede!  I’m choking!  I’m choking!!”

“Aw, I love you too,” Kaede laughed, ruffling Saki’s hair and finally letting her go.

Saki coughed a few times, rubbing her throat.

“I didn’t know you were here!” she said.  “I wasn’t sure if you’d come!”

“Hell yeah I’m gonna come.  Thanks for inviting me to your secret bash,” Kaede said with a big goofy grin.  “Mostyn-senpai was showing me his shapeshifting.  _ Wicked _ cool.  I cannot believe what you guys can do.”

Saki looked so massively relieved that it was a wonder she didn’t keel over right then.  Honestly. This girl was a walking disaster. Minato plucked the hot dog stick from her hands before she dropped it.

“I’m really glad you’re here,” Saki said, gripping Kaede’s hands.  “I mean...that you’re still around and stuff.”

“Oh, hey, don’t get sappy on me,” Kaede said, flushing in the light of the bonfire.  “You’re my friend, Saki. I’m not gonna disappear on you just cause you and the rest of your friends are a little different.”

Her smile slipped a little.

“Uh...you okay, for real though?  I heard there was almost a fight the other day, between Osiris and Obelisk.”

“Oh, that,” Minato said.  “Wasn’t really a fight. More like posturing.”

Kaede shifted uncomfortably.

“Okay...well, you guys be careful,” she said.  “I don’t have all the details, but...Obelisk is getting nastier I feel like.  At least, Harbison’s group is.”

“Harbison?” Saki said.

“Yeah.  Kylie Harbison.  She went to one of the American middle schools affiliated with Duel Academia, and transferred here directly into Blue.  She’s the top student in the dorm, even higher ranked than the third-years, and she’s got kind of a following.”

Kaede grimaced.

“There’s a couple rumors floating around, especially about yours and Saya-senpai’s graduation duel last year.  I don’t know what the endgame here is, but...the last thing I want is for what you guys have here to get messed up.”

She glanced out at the bonfire party, and Saki and Minato looked too.  Nina was sitting on the shoulders of one of the first-year girls, a tallish broadish girl with red hair in a ponytail and pale skin that glowed in the firelight.  Taiki was on Taro’s shoulders, and the two of them appeared to be playing some kind of game of chicken, half wrestling while Anani squeaked that they were getting too close to the fire.  Mostyn was shapeshifting his hands while he talked animatedly with Lindbloom, whose big, feathered tail swished behind her. Sitting by the fire, a dark-skinned girl with lavender hair appeared to be reading Akiara’s palms while Ji-U and Eun crowded around her.

Minato felt something in their chest tighten, and when they looked at Saki, they could see the same vague nervousness beneath her expression.

On a whim, they reached out and grabbed her hand, squeezing.  Saki let out a breath all at once, as though she’d been holding it for a while.

“Thanks, Kaede-san,” Minato said.  “But I think as long as we’ve got all our friends, and friends like you, too, out there, that we’re going to be fine.”

Kaede blinked.  Then she gave them a tentative smile.

“Well, I like that attitude,” she said.  “Anyway, point me in the direction of hot dogs, because I could eat a whole horse right about now!”

Somewhere in the distance, Nina let out a squeak as she tumbled off of the other girl’s shoulders, and a fair girl with long blond hair had to catch her from falling into the fire by sending out a gust of wind.  Minato let out a breathy laugh.

It would never be boring in Osiris, at the very least.  Some things would always be the same.


	7. The Hands of Fate! - The True Power of an Oracle

The sand slipped beneath Kayoko’s feet, and he thought, like he had on the first day of class, that the beach was a very weird place for them to have their homeroom class.  Why not the woods, or why not the plateau on the other side of the island, or why not even rebuild that so-called abandoned dorm and use that as Osiris dorm’s school?

He scratched at his neck.  It always felt weird to put his hair up, but he’d been feeling especially masculine today, so he’d tucked his long hair up and pinned it beneath a floppy hat as best he could.  He couldn’t bring himself to cut it, but on masculine days it made things annoying.

He was nearly to the group when Hanako looked up, and her eyes lit up.  She waved him over.

"Good morning," Hanako signed.  

Kayoko smiled, and signed back.  Lin only nodded and smiled; they were using their crutches today, so it was hard for them to get their hands up to sign.  They turned fully towards Kayoko to speak, and Kayoko stared at their lips to get the message as best they could.

“We’re already joining Saiou-sensei,” Lin said.  “We can go straight there.”

Lin nodded up towards the other end of the beach.  They waved to the rest of their unit, and moved off.  Kayoko’s palms itched with excitement. On his first day here, he’d helped Hanako have a full-on vision.  He couldn’t wait to see what else he could learn with his powers here! Maybe he’d finally have a full on vision of his own, not just the little tidbits and glimmers that he got when he looked over people’s hands.

Saiou-sensei had chosen a part of the beach that was less sandy than the rest, the dirt packed more hard.  On a small shelf of rock, there was a stack of cards, and beside that, a small pouch. He turned as they approached, smiling slightly.  He had a very kind looking face, though he also often looked very tired. He motioned for the three of them to find a place to sit. Hanako perched on the ground, and Lin sat carefully on the edge of the rock, wincing as they leaned their crutches in front of them.

Saiou said something to Lin, which Kayoko didn’t quite catch, but guess that it was probably about asking Lin if they were all right to sit out here.  Lin said something back, which seemed to be a confirmation.

Kayoko sat down next to Hanako and folded his hands into his lap, waiting for class to begin.  Saiou took a moment to carefully sit down in front of them before he started.

Saiou was clumsy at sign-language, and it often muffled some of his words, but he did his best, and Kayoko could usually get the gist.  He signed for Kayoko as he spoke to the others.

“Good morning,” Saiou said.  “Since we’ve had the time for me to learn more about your powers, I think I have an exercise I’d like for us to do.”

He took his cards off of the rock beside him, and began to shuffle them deftly.  Kayoko inhaled — soft glimmers of power flickered from between his fingers as he shuffled.  Kayoko could see the glimmer of a few cards in particular, which rose up through the deck through the shuffling, before the light faded and Saiou set them in front of him to speak again.

“There is no real set way to teach an oracle how to use their powers,” he said.  “Throughout history, those with abilities like ours have often been very rare and far between.  They were seen as mediators of the gods, and were often self-taught in how to control their visions, if they could control them at all.”

He indicated his cards before him.

“As we know more about the connection between our world and the spirit world now, we know more about the origin of an oracle’s visions,” he said.  “Oracles are, by nature, closer to the between than others. Even more so than the others in your class, who are more attuned to the spirit world.”

Hanako’s hand shot up beside Kayoko, and he turned to try and read her question.

“Sensei, what exactly does that mean?” Hanako asked. “I learned a lot about the spirit world and the layers of dimensions last year, but...nothing about anything called the ‘between.’”

Kayoko turned back to Saiou, who was nodding.

“You’re very right,” he said.  “But let me bring Hamasaki-san up to the same speed as you and Wen-san, before I answer that.”

He focused on Kayoko, who sat up straight, eager for more of this information.  All his life, he’d been laughed at for claiming to know things when he read palms, or else chased after by girls who wanted to know if so-and-so liked them and got mad when Kayoko couldn’t divine that.  He’d always, always had some sense that there was something else in the world, something greater than he could see from where he was, even with the flickers he gained from his intuition. But not until he’d arrived at this school had he gotten more than a glimpse of it.  

“This universe is made up of twelve dimensions, and we have varying information about each of them,” Saiou said.  “At the top of the spire is the Unknown: we know only of it through its effect on our world, and some theorize that it may be the afterlife, but it is impenetrable.

“Below the Unknown is the World of Fragments.  We know little of this world, as well, as it seems that the whole dimension was shattered in two by some unknown force, and if there are inhabitants there, we are incapable of contacting them.”

He looked to Hanako.

“Perhaps you and Wen-san would like to see how much you remember?”

Hanako perked up, and Kayoko twisted to look at her.  Hanako twisted too so that she was looking right at Kayoko as she spoke.

“Beneath the World of Fragments is a place called Neo-Space,” Hanako explained.  “It’s an ephemeral world that physical beings can’t remain in for long. And just beneath that is our own world!”

Kayoko turned to look at Lin, next, as Hanako nodded to them.  Lin crossed their crutches over their legs, gathering their thoughts for a moment.

“Directly below us is Fairy’s Peak,” they said.  “It’s the home of most fairy and light spirits we know.  It’s also the origin of many human stories of the realm of faeries, since it’s so close to our world and the easiest to slip into.

“And beneath that is the Bifrost.  It’s the second most common realm for humans to accidentally slip into, and many of our mythologies spring from the great beings that live there.  Many spirits close to the gods settled in that realm.”

Saiou took over next.

“Very good,” he said.  “The next four realms below that are where the densest spirit populations live, and are also attuned to one of the four elements.  First, Air, a world of endless sky. Then, Earth, a deeply primitive place where the most beastly of creatures live. God’s Keep, or Fire, is next.  This is the world where most of the spirits we know live, and its the center of their government. Below that, finally, is Ocean, an endless realm of water.”

Kayoko leaned forward, thrumming with excitement

“And what’s left?  That’s...two left, right?  What’s at the bottom?” he said.  Speaking out loud was weird, humming against his throat, but he was too excited to wait for them to translate his sign language.

Saiou’s lips pressed together briefly.

“The final two realms are not ones many like to speak of,” he said.  “Beneath Ocean is what’s known as Dark World. It’s...I suppose you could compare it to a human rendition of hell.  It is the home of many demons and often the place of exile for spirit world prisoners.”

He sighed, rubbing his temples briefly before continuing.

“And the final world, at the very bottom, is what the duel spirits call the Endless.”

Kayoko felt a chill fall over him, and he wasn’t sure if it was from Saiou’s clear expression of nerves or from the way that Hanako looked stiff, or just a natural understanding that whatever this Endless was, it wasn’t good.

“We know as much about the Endless as we do about the Unknown.  When duel spirits are killed or die of unnatural causes, they sink to the Endless.  They can be dragged back with effort, but it changes them irreparably, and few who have been there remember the experience.”

Kayoko shivered again.  

"Sounds bad," he signed.

“Very bad,” Saiou said, grimacing.  “But, all this was simply a primer for our real topic, and I apologize for dumping so much information on you at once.”

He picked up his cards again and began to deal them out in a tarot form.  Kayoko watched carefully, and was excited to see a light glimmer through the cards, like the ripple of light through the top of the ocean in rainbow colors.

“Did you see anything when I did that?” Saiou said, signing once the cards were done.

“A glimmer,” Kayoko said.

“I saw...something like a smoke,” Hanako said.

“It was like the light passed through a gemstone,” Lin said, frowning with confusion.

“What you saw was an expression of our power — oracles gain their power not from any of the main dimensions, as the others do, but from the between: the spaces that fill in the dimensions and connect them.”

All three looked up with surprise, waiting to hear more.

“Though the dimensions are effectively separate, there must be some connection between them in order to go from one to another, correct?” Saiou said.  “That is the between. Think of it like an ocean, or a series of veins, filling in the spaces between them.”

He gestured to the cards, which had stopped glowing.

“And in those spaces, the worlds become somewhat jumbled.  There is a lot of crossing over between the dimensions there, leaving behind echoes and impressions of everything that passes through them.  Time itself becomes jumbled in this space, leaving behind its own footprints. This is where our visions come from.”

He looked to all three of them.

“An oracle’s soul is tangled, somehow in the fabric of the between,” he said.  “This connection expresses itself in flashes that pass from the between to you, which your body finds a way to interpret in a way that makes sense to it at the time.”

He nodded at Lin, Hanako, and Kayoko in turn.

“Whether that be by reading the light through a gemstone...or picking up on the echo of a possibility through touching someone who’s fate has passed through the between...or by reading the markings left behind on a person’s hand.”

Kayoko thrummed with more excitement.  He’d always known that the world was bigger than it seemed!

“Will knowing this help us use our powers?” Kayoko asked.

Saiou nodded with a smile.

“Absolutely.  With awareness of your connection to the between, you can begin to manipulate the level of connection.  You can draw yourself away from it to conserve power, or even push your soul further into it to amplify your visions.”

He raised his eyebrows then, however.

“This, however, is not something you are allowed to experiment on your own with just yet.”

Kayoko snapped his fingers with disappointment, making Hanako hide a laugh behind her hand.  Her shoulders shook.

Saiou retrieve the pouch from the rock beside it, and dumped it into his hands.  It was...a bunch of dice, Kayoko saw. They were deep and rich in color, as though they’d been carved from gemstones.  Saiou put them on the ground before he spoke again so that he could sign.

“I’m going to have all three of you each use your abilities in this exercise,” he said.  “Kawaguchi-san, please sit in between Wen-san and Hamasaki-san. I want you to be able to be in physical contact with them at the same time.”

Hanako stood up and moved behind Kayoko, settling in between him and Lin.  She rested her hands awkwardly on Lin’s knee and then on Kayoko’s offered hand.

“I am going to roll these dice several times,” Saiou said.  “Hamasaki-san, please focus on the movement of my hands. Wen-san, please focus on the way the light passes through the dice when they fall.  And Kawaguchi-san, focus on the sensations you receive from your classmates.”

“Sensei, if it’s all right to ask, what is this exercise supposed to do?” Hanako asked.

Saiou nodded.

“If all three of you actively try to tap into your powers at once, you’ll all draw closer to the between.  It will enhance the sensation and give you a sense of what you’re looking for when you want to actively use your abilities.”

Lin tentatively raised a hand, and Saiou nodded at him.

“Is there anything you want us to try and scry for in particular?”

Saiou considered.

“The future is difficult and can be troubling,” he said.  “I would like for you each to attempt to scry the past. Think of more recent memory that is dear to you.  Focus on trying to bring that moment into clarity within you.”

Kayoko perked up.  Scrying the past? He’d never even thought of that possibility.  He could learn so much about people and places if he could learn how to look into their pasts with his power!

“Let’s begin,” Saiou said, picking up the dice.

He tossed them into the air, and Kayoko focused his attention on Saiou’s hands.  He’d never tried to scry something other than a person’s future when he looked at hands, and only the future of the hands’ owner.  How could he see something of his own past in someone else’s hands?

Saiou tossed the dice up in the air again, and Kayoko wasn’t seeing a thing — not even a glimmer of light like he had before.  Come on! He wanted to see something!! What could he try to scry? Something in the past, Saiou had said. But Kayoko didn’t know how to see a past other than Saiou’s in Saiou’s hands, and that seemed rude to look into without permission.

Saiou threw the dice up again.  Kayoko followed the movement of his fingers, caught the glimpse of the lines in his palms.  He tried to clear his mind, think only about the movements, and where those would lead.

It was sort of entrancing once he got himself into it.  Like hypnotism. Oops. His late night of reading was probably getting back to haunt him.  His eyes felt droopy.

He followed the movement of Saiou’s hands one more time, and then he heard Hanako suck in a breath.  Some strange spark passed through her hands and into Kayoko’s. Kayoko’s eyes flickered down in spite of himself, and he caught the sight of the back of Hanako’s hand, and his own fingers beneath hers, and then....

It was like sinking under a gentle ocean.  The world seemed to get far away, glowing with thick outlines on the edges.  He saw patterns growing across his hand, spreading out like a map on the ground, curling and growing like vines.  And those vines meant something — it tingled. Kayoko couldn’t stop looking at the vines, as they spread from each set of hands around him and filled the air with a beautiful mosaic of light.  It was a map — a map for his brain to follow.

Several clustered echoes fought for his attention, but he focused on the lines in his own hands.  He was supposed to scry his own past, right?

No images emerged, not in the way Hanako or Lin described their visions.  Instead, the lines seemed to become a language that he could understand, writing across the air before him, giving him little glimmers of familiarity.

A glimmer of gingerbread baking — mom.  Another glimmer of the sharp scent of pine and the thrum of fingers beating a rhythm against the table for Kayoko to hear — oneesan.

Oh, Kayoko breathed.  He was, for a moment, home.  Home in his kitchen, with his mother making cookies and his sister beating out the rhythm of her new song that she was writing with her band, drumming it into the table beside Kayoko’s hands so he could hear it vibrate up into his chest.

The lines curled back up slowly, folding back under the hands they spread from, and Kayoko let himself come back.  He opened eyes that he hadn’t realized were closed, and felt Hanako’s hand twitch in his.

Saiou was smiling at all of them.

“Well?” he said.  “How did it go?”

"That was awesome," Kayoko signed.


	8. Makings of Destiny! - I’m an Alchemist?!

Saki stood on the tip of her toes, trying in vain to reach the book she needed.

The library was quiet at this time of the afternoon, and she hadn’t seen a stool anywhere.  Who’d made these shelves so tall, anyway, without giving short people like her something to stand on??  This library was big enough that you could even have a rolling ladder, for goodness’ sake!

Angel balanced on her shoulder awkwardly, staring at the book.  He tried to leap off her shoulder to grab it, but his spiritual body passed right through the bookshelf, and he reappeared on the ground with a very sour expression.

“Thanks for trying,” Saki said.

This was the last book she needed for her history report, ugh!  She just wanted to be able to finish so she could go visit Saya and Hinata.

A pale hand stretched over her, selecting the book she was reaching for and pulling it from the shelf.  Saki’s eyes widened and she stumbled back onto her heels. A hand gently caught her against the shoulder before she fell.

“Was this what you were looking for?”

She didn’t recognize the voice.  And when she turned around, she definitely didn’t recognize the owner of it.  He was taller than her, but incredibly slender. He could have been a model, actually; he was incredibly pretty, in almost an unreal sort of way.  His cheeks were smoothly sculpted, his dark eyes glittering with just a hint of humor, his dark hair swooped neatly over his eyes.

He was also wearing an Obelisk coat.

“Oh, uh, thanks!” Saki fumbled, suddenly nervous.  She remembered with painful clarity Kaede’s warnings about Obelisk, and wondered if this was about to become some kind of hazing ritual where he held the book out of her reach or something.

But he simply tapped the book to her chest, and she blinked, taking it from him.  A small smile twitched at his lips.

“Something wrong?”

“Oh, uh...no, sorry,” Saki said, blushing.

“Did you think I’d try to play keep away with you?”

Saki flushed deeper.

“I shouldn’t have thought so poorly of you,” she mumbled, bowing.

He laughed, and it was a light sort of sound that put her at ease.  He was grinning when she looked back up.

“Don’t worry about it,” he said.  “I’ll bet Obelisk hasn’t given you many reasons to be fond of it.”

Saki ducked her head.  She wasn’t sure what to say to that; it was true, after all.

He pointed to her book, then.

“Ancient Cities of the World, huh?  History?”

“Oh, yes,” Saki said.  “I have a report proposal due at the end of the week.”

“Pretty big subject there.  Do you like history?”

“Uh...I guess I like learning in general?  I’ve always been good at school. It’s kind of fun...all subjects, I mean!”

She blushed.  Oh gosh, she was sounding like a total nerd right now.  If he wasn’t making fun of her before, he definitely would now!

But he just grinned again.

“Surprised you’re not a Blue in that case,” he said. “Oh, please don’t take that wrong.  I think we’ve all misjudged Red in our own ways.”

Saki wasn’t sure she liked the way he said that or not.  She studied him for a moment, suddenly nervous. Did he know the truth about Red?  Was he trying to hint to her that he knew her secret? Or was he making fun of her?

“What do you mean by that?” she asked carefully.

He ran a hand through his hair, and then smoothed the wrinkles of his coat.

“Most people tend to believe that the structure of the school is made to punish weakness,” he said.  “That it’s a power structure: Osiris is the bottom, Obelisk is the top. But I don’t think that’s true at all.”

He tilted his head, and she found her tilting her own with him, waiting for him to finish his thought.

“I think this school was made to better foster growth through a structure,” he said.  “Osiris Reds are not low achievers, but rather, people who need more support and motivation.  The small, close knit class of Red fosters that and helps them push forward. Obelisks are already used to being high achievers, so they’re placed into a more distant learning environment, with a larger group to compete against, to better show them that they aren’t necessarily the best in the world anymore, as they might have felt at the top of their middle schools.”

He smiled and winked.

“And Ra Yellows are in the middle, needing maybe a bit of both worlds,” he said.  “Each environment suits the student’s needs, not necessarily branding them as better or worse objectively.”

Saki couldn’t help but gape at him.  Even Angel seemed to stare, though it was doubtful he’d fully understood what was said, or cared.  After a beat, she shook herself out of her stare.

“Wow,” she said.  “I...I’d never considered it like that.”

He smiled again.

“Well, I think we could all do with a little reminder of that, if it’s actually true that that’s what they thought when they made the school, of course,” he said, chuckling.  “It would be better if we thought about bettering ourselves, and becoming the people we deserve to be, rather than trying to look better than others, don’t you agree?”

Saki nodded slowly.  She hugged the book to her chest, letting his words simmer.  He made a lot of sense, and...he was nice. Surprisingly nice.

“You have a pretty cool way of looking at things,” she said.

He chuckled again.

“Well, sometimes there’s little to do other than stand around and think,” he said.  “So my brain does a lot of it.”

Saki giggled behind her hand, and he grinned, leaning back against the other shelf behind him, as though pleased with getting her to laugh.  As she giggled, though, she felt her pager buzz. Oh, that was her calendar! She needed to check this out and then meet up with Saya and Hinata like she’d promised.

“I’m sorry, I need to go.  I have to meet a friend,” she said.

“No worries,” he said, nodding.  “But let me get your name, at least.  Talking to you has been fun.”

“I didn’t have much to add to your ideas,” she said, blushing.  “But I’m Saki. Yamaguchi Saki.”

He smiled and nodded at her with another wink.

“Ashikaga Kakon,” he said.  “Maybe I’ll see you around the library sometime soon.”

She found herself smiling.  It was a strangely warm feeling, coming out of a conversation with him.

“I hope so!”

* * *

“Sorry I’m late,” Saki gasped, jogging to the door.

“Late?  You’re two minutes early,” Saya said, raising her eyebrows.

“Oh, really?”  Saki checked her watch.  “Oh, I am. I guess I’m really mixed up now.”

Saya laughed, clapping her on the shoulder.

“Come on in.  Hinata’s got the board set up for mahjong.  It’s your turn to get your ass kicked; there’s only so many times I can stomach it.”

Saki snorted, which turned into a hiccuping giggle.  She slipped out of her shoes in the entryway and followed Saya down the small hall.  They went into the kitchen this time, to the right instead of into the living room on the right.

Hinata was already sitting at the kitchen table, staring at a half played game of mahjong.  Her hair was pulled back into a ponytail today, and it swished when she looked up.

“Oh, hey, Saki!” she said.  “How are you at mahjong?”

“I’ve...never played,” Saki admitted.  “I mean, except for on a mobile phone? And uh...this setup looks way different."

Hinata gasped, putting a hand over her chest in mock indignation.

“Blasphemy!!  We have to fix that immediately.  Saya! We’re redealing the board.”

“Thank god.  I was doing awful.”

Saya and Hinata knocked down their little tiles, and Saki took a seat in the middle of the table, on either side of them while they reset the game.

“How’s school going, squirt?” Hinata said, as she dealt out a wall of face down tiles to the middle of the board.

“It’s only like the first two weeks and there’s so much homework,” Saki groaned.  “I’m literally dying.”

Hinata snickered as she rolled a die, and then counted the tiles on the wall in front of her and started passing them out to Saki, Saya, and herself.

“That old fossil Chronos is still teaching, isn’t he?  He’s a homework demon.”

“He’s given us three reports!  Due next week! And that’s not even counting all the chemistry and history reading I have to do!”

Saya and Hinata tipped their tiles back up to face them, and Saki copied them.  She didn’t understand anything about this game, and she hadn’t the faintest clue of whether tiles she’d gotten were good or bad.  Hinata tossed a tile to the center of the board.

“How about Osiris?  Things going well?” Saya asked.  She reached for the discarded tile. “Oh, pung.”

She took the discarded bamboo seven tile and placed it with the two matching ones from her hand.  Saki stared blankly — she hoped someone would explain the rules of this game to her soon.

“Oh, yes!  We’ve gotten new teachers,” Saki said.  “Tania-sensei — ”

“Yo, wait — Tania?  Big lady, sexy muscles, sexier scar on her face?” Saya said, brightening.

“That’s...uh, definitely her,” Saki said, snicking.

“Whoa, back up — sexy lady with muscles?” Hinata said, leaning forward with interest.

“Sorry, neesan, I think she’s married.”

“Oh, she is,” Saki said, blushing.  “To Professor Misawa.”

Hinata snapped her fingers, sighing.

“Damn.  Next time.”

Saya turned back to Saki.

“Yeah, I only met her once, but it was in the spirit world on a field trip,” Saya said.  “So she’s teaching here now? Isn’t she a...”

“Yeah, she’s actually a tiger,” Saya said.  “She showed us once, but she can’t hold her true form in this realm very easily.”

“She’s a sexy lady _and_ a tiger?  God. Her spouse is so lucky.  When am I gonna get a sexy tiger girlfriend?”

“Neesan, put your furry away before you scare Saki.”

“She’s here teaching the full and mixed spirits unit,” Saki said, staring at her tiles and trying to see if she had any that matched Saya’s discarded tile.  It was the only thing she sort of understood she should do so far. “To help them learn to acclimate to the human world. But she’s checked in with my group, too, to help us learn to communicate better with our spirit partners.”

“Speaking of spirit partners, is Angel here today?” Hinata asked, looking around.

Saki glanced around, and saw him sitting next to Hinata’s chair, staring up at her and lashing his tail.  Saki put a hand over her mouth to hide her giggle.

“He’s on the floor next to you.  I think he’s waiting for an invitation to sit in your lap.”

“Oh my gosh, cute baby!  You’re always welcome up here!”

Angel immediately leaped up and settled onto her lap.  Hinata shivered slightly, and Saki wondered if she could still sort of sense Angel’s presence.  She patted her hand over the space where he was, and even though she couldn’t see or touch him, Angel purred.

“Saki, it’s your turn,” Saya said.  “Need any help making a move?”

“Oh, gosh, yes, please.  I don’t know what I’m doing.  What’s even the win condition for this game?”

Saya leaned over in her chair to try and get a peek at her hand, and Saki shifted over in her seat so that Saya could see.

But then all at once, Saya’s face went pale.  She snapped her eyes shut and pressed a hand to her forehead.

“Saya-senpai?” Saki asked, lifting out of her chair slightly.

Angel tumbled out of Hinata’s lap, raising his hackles and hissing.

Hinata’s face had gone bone white, her hands grabbing the sides of her chair in a stiff, trembling pose.

“It’s watching me,” she gasped, eyes filling with tears.  “Please, please, stop, please let me go, please don’t look at me, please, stop it, stop it, stop it!”

Saya was shaking, her mouth hanging open slightly, hand sliding to clamp over her eyes, knocking her glasses off onto the table.  Saki leaped to her feet, her hands shaking. What was happening? Hinata was having an attack, but Saya was freaking out, too! What was going on?

“Saya-senpai??  Hinata-san!”

Angel spun in frantic circles, hissing and spitting and lashing his tail around, wings flapping and sending up little whirlwinds of down.  Saki fumbled into her jacket for her pager. Andersen-sensei! She’d call Andersen-sensei!

The pager slipped out of her trembling fingers, hitting the table and then clattering to the floor.  She dove back down for it, but her hands weren’t working right and she just knocked it away. She had to crawl after it to where it had fallen beside Hinata.

As her fingers closed around it, however, she felt fingers tighten around her shoulders.  She gasped as Hinata was suddenly right in her face, holding her by the shoulders with a panicked look in her eyes.

“It’s watching you,” she whispered desperately.  “You have to hide. It’s watching us, it won’t leave, it won’t _leave_ — ”

She heard the stumble of feet, and then Saya was putting her hand on top of Hinata’s, trying to get her to release her death grip on Saki.

“Hina-nee, breathe, you’re hurting Saki, you need to — fuck, not again — ”

Saya gasped, and her hand slipped off of Hinata’s, and Saki gasped as she felt Saya’s head fall against the back of her neck.

“Saya-senpai!” she gasped.  She fumbled back for Saya, grabbing her hand.  She didn’t know where her pager had gone. Hinata was still shaking her slightly, fingers digging into her shoulders, babbling the same thing over and over.  Saki grabbed her hand, too.

“Please!” she gasped.  “Both of you, please, wake up!”

Angel let out an echoing keen unlike any sound she’d heard him make before.

And then she felt a strange stabbing feeling in her chest.  It didn’t _hurt_...but it felt like it should have.  It was like there was a huge thorn, growing into her heart, and yet, there was no pain, only an eerie tingle that fled over her skin.  It was growing bigger and bigger, swelling in her chest so huge that she was going to choke on it. Her grip on Saya’s and Hinata’s hands felt like she was melting into them, like she couldn’t have let go of them if she tried.

The connection with Hinata felt hot, static-y and charged.  The grip with Saya felt cool, hollow, like part of her was slipping away somewhere else.  And she was, Saki realized with a start. She remembered like a spell, something Saya had told her years ago — that she had once had the power to switch places with her sister, and see from her eyes.  Saya must be seeing from Hinata’s eyes right now! That’s why she was reacting almost the same way as Hinata!

The feeling in her chest was getting thicker and heavier, and the stabbing was starting to hurt now.  But Saki leaned into the sudden forged connection between her and the other two. Maybe — maybe if she followed this feeling, she could help!

Hinata’s static met Saya’s cool smoke in the middle of Saki’s chest.  She could feel Hinata’s panic, Saya’s fear and desperation, as though it were her own.  The two sensations flooded into her, and she felt Angel, then, his paws on her chest. She felt his tiny teeth nibble right over her heart, where the feeling was swelling the strongest, and then she gasped.

Something popped free of her, and her connection with the two girls broke.  Blindly, she grabbed for the thing that Angel had just ripped out of her chest.  Her fingers closed around a cold steel circle — which immediately warmed beneath her fingers as she focused on it.

A warm aura fell over her and the other two.  It was like a haze of golden light that settled over them, surrounding them.  

Immediately, Hinata’s fingers relaxed on Saki’s shoulders.  She blinked, gasping.

“Where...was I?” she whispered.

Saya stirred too, gasping as she sat upright.

“Hina-nee?” she gasped.  “What...”

The warm golden light faded slightly, falling back inside the medallion that Saya was now holding.  It grew cold once more under her fingers.

Hinata looked around dizzily.  Angel butted his head against her knee, and inexplicably she looked down right at him.

A squeak of delight escaped her lips.

“I can see you!” she said.

She scooped him up into her arms, and he immediately curled up against her, purring.

“Saki?” Saya said, putting her hand on Saki’s shoulder.  “I’m sorry; are you okay?”

Saki didn’t know what to say yet.  Her heart was pounding, and the disk was biting into her fingers from how tightly she was holding it.  What had just happened?

Saya blinked, leaning over Saki’s shoulder.  She carefully pushed Saki’s fingers back from the medallion.  Her eyes widened.

“Where’d you get this?” Saya asked.

“I, uh...I don’t know.  I was holding both your hands, and something just kind of grew in my chest, and then Angel pulled it out, and...what _is_ it?”

Saya shook her head.  She held out a hand questioningly, and Saki placed the medallion in her palm.  Saya studied it — it was small, round, and carved with thin curving lines. Two pretty hazel stones were set into it, on the top and bottom like the dots on a yin yang symbol.  Frowning, Saya tugged on it — it came apart easily, in the shapes of a yin yang as well. It snapped back together just as easily.

“You made this,” Saya said with surprise.  “Saki, this is alchemy.”

Saki’s eyes widened.

“Huh?  But I’m not an alchemist!”

“The more you practice your first skills, the stronger you get and the more likely new abilities are to start popping up,” Saya said.  “Alchemy does that a lot — you hone one skill, and then suddenly alchemy appears. It was the same for me. I pushed my switching with my sister so hard that one day alchemy happened.”

She popped the medallion apart and back together a few times.

Hinata seemed to finally be coming fully awake, still cuddling Angel.  He snuggled against her face as she licked her dry lips.

“But...what was that light?” she said.  “I remember...I was panicking, but then...I felt safe.  Like I’d been taken away from where my brain thought I was.”

She snuggled Angel to her face.

“And why can I see Angel all of a sudden?”

Saya tested the medallion again, taking it apart and putting it back together.

“Wow,” she said.  “Saki, this is pretty intense.  You didn’t just make a magic item...you forged all three of our powers together into a physical form.”

Saki gaped.  

“But how??  I didn’t train to do that!!”

“First alchemy is always a pretty big one,” Saya said.  “All that pent up energy comes out, especially under stress.  You must have automatically filtered our agitated magic through you with the physical contact.  That light was the effect — you pretty much woke up Hinata’s sight by giving her part of your powers, and you also helped her mind detach from her panic attack by giving her some of mine, too, letting her temporarily switch into my brain.”

Saki stared at the both of them with huge eyes.

“I...I think I need time to process this,” she said.

“Talk to Judai,” Saya said, putting her hands on top of Saki’s.  “He’ll help you out.”

A smile exploded over her face, then.  She threw her arms around Saki, squeezing her so tightly Saki almost choked.

“I can’t believe it!! You’re an alchemist!! Oh my god!!  We’ve gotta celebrate, I can’t believe you’re in my court now!!  Oh my _god_!”

Saya let her go, but shook her excitedly, rattling Saki’s brain.  Hinata laughed as she slowly tried to stand up, still holding Angel.

“And fuck you, Saki-chan,” she cried suddenly, staring at Saki’s hand on the forgotten game.  “That discard gave you a mahjong!”


	9. The Trial of the Quiet Girls - Crystrons and Shinobirds Team Up!

“Jains!  Double Light and Darkness Sword!” Ji-U and Eun shouted at the same time.

Their opponents’ life points hit zero, and the twins giggled, giving each other double high fives.  Their twin soldiers, one in all white armor and one in all black, but otherwise looking exactly the same, faded from the field.  Akiara clapped from the otherwise empty stands — but quietly, because as much as she trusted that Ji-U and Eun could wave a Kaiba name around and get them out of anything, she didn’t want to attract attention.  They weren’t supposed to be using the field after hours, after all, and it was even after curfew. Andersen and Yuki would definitely scold them.

The two Obelisk students the twins had beaten just scowled, jumping from the stage and storming off.

“Don’t think this changes anything!” one of them shouted over their shoulder.

Ji-U stuck her tongue out at them, pulling at the bottom of one of her eyes to make a funny face.

“Come back next time you want to get defeated,” Eun said, waving cheerily.

Akiara smiled as the twins hopped off the stage, and Eun ran to the stands first, leaning against the railing.  She looked flushed and alight with excitement — it was pretty, Akiara thought, blushing. Eun was so pretty.

“Well?” Eun said.  “Was that fun?”

“I like watching you duel,” Akiara said.

“You should have joined in!” Ji-U said. 

“B-but that wouldn’t have been fair,” Akiara said.

“Well, I could have stepped out and let you duel with Eun,” Ji-U said.

Akiara covered her face in her hands.

“N-no!  I would have held you back then!  You two are just so good at tag duels.”

Eun was frowning a little when Akiara peeked between her fingers.  But she didn’t say anything, she just reached over the railing and tugged at Akiara’s knee.

“Well, we don’t want to get you in trouble.  Let’s go before one of the teachers find us.”

Akiara hopped up and shuffled sideways down the aisle to get to the stairs, meeting the twins at the exit.  Eun hooked her arm into Akiara’s, and Ji-U’s with her other arm. She bounced a little as though trying to get them to skip down the hall, but Akiara tripped over her feet and Ji-U almost pushed them all over, so Eun let go of her arm and only held onto Akiara’s.

“Man, that was fun though,” she said, grinning.  “Wiping those smug grins off those Obelisk faces!  Someday they’ll have to learn not to make fun of us!”

Akiara smiled.  Eun really did look so excited and happy.  It was nice to see her looking so smiley. She tended to be slightly quieter of the two twins, Ji-U usually doing most of the talking.  But Eun was excited now, and she tried to skip again before Akiara nearly fell over.

“Sorry,” Eun said.

“You’re gonna kill her by accident one of these days,” Ji-U said, rolling her eyes.

Akiara blushed.  And then she felt something in her get a little quiet.

She’d been friends with the twins since last year.  Friends. That was such an odd concept for her, even now.  She’d never had anyone to hang out with. Anyone who asked her how she was, or included her in things like this.

And she sort of wondered why.  Why had the twins asked her to come with them?  She hadn’t done anything except watch them duel.  She didn’t feel like she contributed very much.

And yet...she couldn’t bring herself to ask.  Because if she did, she might break some spell, and they’d realize that she was no fun to be around and leave her.  That was so selfish, she thought, stealing another glance at Eun. She was jabbering now, excitedly recounting all of the combos they’d done even though both of them had been there.  Her eyes were so sparkly and so alight, and...Akiara didn’t want to not be friends with her. She was scared. For some reason, the thought of losing Eun hurt more than losing anyone else. 

A scuffling sound caused Eun and Ji-U to stop talking, and Akiara to come out of her thoughts.

“And what do you think you’re doing out here?” came one of the Obelisk’s voices.  “It’s way past curfew!”

“Y-You’re out too...”

“That’s no excuse, firstie.  Maybe you need to learn a lesson or two.”

“A-ah...please, I just...forgot something...my teacher said I could go get it...”

The twins immediately whirled, and Akiara peeked out from behind them.

A tiny girl in a red uniform was pressed up against the wall, the two Obelisks that the twins had just dueled blocking her way out.  Akiara sort of recognized her — she was one of the new first-years. A tiny girl, even shorter than Akiara, with a very thin frame and big eyes, and dark orange hair in a bob.  She fixed her glasses nervously, looking up at the two bullies on either side of her.

“Hey!” Ji-U shouted.  “Didn’t have enough yet, did you, you losers?”

The Obelisks looked up.  One of them sneered.

“We really could get you all in trouble for breaking curfew,” he said.

“Yeah?  And you’d have to admit you were out past curfew too!” said Ji-U.

“You really think you near-dropouts are gonna get off so easily?”

Eun had that face, the one she made when she was getting ready to pull the Kaiba card.  Akiara tuned out the argument, looking out from behind the twins at the first-year girl.  Akiara couldn’t remember her name. But she looked...really scared. She looked like she was going to cry.  Akiara looked down at the floor, clasping her hands and unclasping them in front of her. The twins were still shouting and arguing with the Obelisk students, and Akiara was starting to feel sort of nervous.

She should just hide back here, and make sure no one saw her.  The twins could handle this. They were good at handling things like this.  She wasn’t. She was good at being quiet, and trying not to attract attention.

The first-year girl squeezed her eyes shut.  Even though the twins had moved closer, the Obelisk students were still boxing her in.  She looked faint.

Akiara knew what that felt like.  She felt a little panic run through  her.

“What the hell is all this racket about?”

The new voice was startling, and everyone froze, looking wildly for some sign of a teacher.

There was no teacher, however — just a tall boy with long, dark orange hair in a ponytail, and a long blue coat.

“Inoue-senpai,” one of the Obelisk students stammered.

The boy glared at them, and the other two students withered.  The girl’s eyes flew open, widening. She looked more panicked than she had this whole time.

The new Obelisk boy looked between the Obelisk students and the twins.  His eyes flickered to the first-year girl, and his lip curled.

“Obelisk is better than making petty quarrels with people who aren’t worth our time,” he said.  “Get back to your dorm.”

“Hey!” Eun said, glowering.  “Don’t you stick that superiority complex on us!  We just beat your Obelisk friends’ asses!”

The Obelisk boy didn’t even acknowledge her.  Instead, his eyes had turned to the girl as soon as the other two students had fled past him.  The girl withered, her hands clasped at her chest, looking anywhere but at him.

Ji-U and Eun ran over to her, and Ji-U put a hand on her shoulder, glaring at the Obelisk boy.

“Why don’t you scram, too?” she said.

The girl flinched a little, though, looking up at the boy finally.  His lips curled more.

“It was bad enough that you were in Osiris,” he said.  “And now you’re flaunting curfew? Who do you think you are?”

“Who do you think  _ you _ are?” Eun shot back.

The girl’s eyes filled with tears, though, and she put her hands on her head, like she was about to have a migraine.

“I-I’m sorry, oniisama,” the first-year girl mumbled.  “I won’t make you bother with me again.”

Both twins immediately snapped straight up.  Eun’s face went white with anger.

“She’s your  _ sister _ ?” she said.  “How can you talk to her like that??”

“Stay out of my family’s business,” the boy said, still glowering at the girl.  “Takako. I’d better not see a lick of you again until you’re in Obelisk.”

“Yes, oniisama,” the girl mumbled.

Akiara felt sick.  The twins both looked like they were about to explode, and Akiara could feel the static in the air making her hair stand on end.  When the twins got mad, stuff happened — and if she was feeling so nervous that she wanted to throw up, she thought...the girl must be feeling so scared and lonely too.

The boy turned on his heel and stalked off.

“Yeah, and stay away, you bastard!” Ji-U shouted, waving her fist.

Eun touched the girl’s shoulder gently.

“You okay?” Eun said.  “Do you need us to walk you back to the dorm?”

The girl shook her head quickly.

“N-no.  I just need to get my notebook,” she said.

“We can come with you.”

“No, I don’t want to bother anyone.  I’m all right by myself.”

The girl turned and ran before either twin could stop her.  She flashed past Akiara, and Akiara saw, for just a moment, the tears that fled in the wake of the girl’s flight.

Akiara didn’t move, listening to the girl’s footsteps running away.  She felt sick.

She should have done something, she thought.

But what should she have done?

* * *

The chatter of the hallways was always too loud.  Akiara waited in the door outside the lecture hall for most of it to disperse, so that she could walk back to her dorm without all the noise or the chance to bump into someone.

She looked back into the lecture hall while she was waiting, her mind wandering to the lesson.  It took her a few moments to realize that the hall wasn’t empty, though.

Oh, she thought, lips parting.  It was her. The first-year from yesterday.

The girl was still sitting at her desk, her back to Akiara.  She didn’t seem to be making any attempt to leave yet, as her things were still stacked up on the space in front of her.

Akiara was surprised to find herself hesitating.  Normally, she felt she’d just duck her head and move on.  But...she couldn’t help but feel sick again, thinking about how scared that girl had looked.  How alone. Even though the twins were standing up for her then, she’d looked like she felt that the only people there were her and her big brother.

Akiara hesitated, shifting from foot to foot.  What could someone like her even do, anyway? She couldn’t be peppy and cheerful like Nina and Taro.  She couldn’t listen well like Minato and Saki. She couldn’t even make jokes like Morgan, or yell like the twins.  She was just...Akiara.

The sound of the hallway was starting to fade a bit, and she could hear just the tiniest sob from inside the lecture hall.

She almost did it without thinking.  Books hugged to her chest, she walked through the doors, and down two steps until she was one level above the girl’s desk.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

Her voice was so quiet that she thought that the girl wouldn’t be able to hear her.  But she jumped, spinning around in her seat. Tears were rolling down her cheeks. She quickly rubbed them away, turning her face back and hiding her cheeks.

“I’m fine!” she squeaked.  “I’m so sorry to bother you!”

“You...you didn’t bother me.”

Akiara fumbled.  She didn’t know what to do here.  Maybe the girl really just wanted her to go away.  Akiara always had, when people asked her if she was okay.  She’d just wanted to be left alone.

Or...no.  No...she really hadn’t, she remembered.  She remembered that first shadow game with Eun, when she’d asked if she was okay.  And Akiara had realized that she wasn’t. That she never had been. And that she’d really, really wanted someone to care about it.

Akiara took another step down.

“Um,” she said.  “Do you...want to talk?”

“No,” the girl said.  “No, I...I don’t want to bother you.  I really don’t want to bother anyone.”

Akiara stepped down again, and then she was in the row in front of the girl.  She put her books down and sat in the chair in front of her, sitting one level beneath her.

“Okay,” Akiara said.  “Then you don’t have to talk.  We can just sit.”

The girl peeked at her between her fingers.  She was clearly still crying, her eyes were red and puffy, and her glasses had been left on the table.  She squinted.

“I’m Tanaka Akiara,” Akiara said.  “I’m in unit three.”

The girl bit her lip.  She covered her eyes again.

“Takako,” she mumbled into her hands.  “I’m Inoue Takako.”

She sniffled.  Akiara waited for another few uncomfortable moments.  She rested her hands in her lap and twiddled her thumbs.

“Um,” she said.  “You know, uh...I didn’t have any friends before I came here.”

Takako didn’t answer.  Akiara took that as an okay to keep talking.

“But um...I know it’s...really hard...to be in Osiris, and um...not understanding your powers or um having anyone to talk to about them, and um...everyone not liking you, because of...Osiris.  But uh...everyone at Osiris is really nice. And um...they want to help, and be friends.”

Takako let out a tiny, thin sob.

“I’m sorry,” she said.  “I’m making you worry about me.  That’s really rude of me.”

“No, it’s not,” Akiara said, feeling a little frustrated now.  “Worrying about...worrying about people is um...it’s what friends do.”

She immediately blushed.  How presumptuous of her! She shouldn’t have said something like that.  She didn’t even know if Takako wanted to be friends with someone like her.  But...but she was crying, and Akiara wanted to help her not cry.

“I’m sorry,” she said.  “I’m not very good at this.”

But Takako was looking at her between her fingers again.  She sniffled. She reached for her glasses, putting them back over her eyes.  Her bottom lip trembled.

“You’re fine at this,” she said.  “I’m not very good at accepting nice things.”

“Me neither,” Akiara said.  “I’m really bad at it! I always think everyone is lying to me at first.”

She blushed deeply again, suddenly feeling bad for admitting that.  But Takako actually let out a tiny, thin giggle.

“You know what?” she sniffled.  “Me too.”

She smiled tentatively, and Akiara gave her a small smile back.

“It’s not bothering you to stay, is it?” Takako asked.

Akiara shook her head.

“Is it bothering you for me to be here?”

“No,” Takako said, looking down at her desk.  “I’m sorry. I don’t know what to say now.”

Akiara looked at her hands, twiddling her thumbs again.

“Um,” she said, her throat suddenly tight.  “I don’t know...why you’re sad, so I um...can’t say that I get it.  And you don’t have to tell me. But um...a lot of bad things happened to me when I was a kid, too.  And it made it really hard to like myself. But um...Osiris is really nice. I think it’s...it’s a nice family.  If you want to be a part of it. They’d want you to be a part of it.”

She looked up.  Takako was crying again, her tears dribbling onto the desk.  Akiara hunched her shoulders, feeling awful. Had she just made things worse??

“Oh, looky here!  A couple of Osiris bugs still hanging around the school?”

Akiara and Takako both flinched at the same time, Akiara curling her head down between her shoulders and Takako shooting up to her feet with wide, wild eyes.

When Akiara was able to look up, she recognized the two Obelisk as the same ones who had dueled the twins yesterday.  They were both leaning on opposite sides of the door, blocking their only exit out, grinning.

“What’s this?  You don’t have your bodyguards today?” the girl sneered.

Akiara couldn’t say anything.  Her throat was too dry. The boy looked at Takako and grinned maliciously.

“And you’re Inoue-chan, aren’t you?  Your big brother’s told us  _ aaaall _ about you.”

Takako pressed her hands to her cheeks to hide the tears, and the two laughed.

“They don’t even talk,” the girl said.  “I think they’re dumb.”

“They’d have to be, to be in Osiris!”

They both laughed again.  But this time, Akiara felt a very strange feeling in her chest.

“Don’t call Osiris dumb,” she said, standing up before she could think about it.

The two looked at her with surprise.  And then the girl laughed again.

“Oh my god!  It does speak!”

Akiara felt like withering up again, but she felt a warmth still flooding through her, and it kept her standing even though her heart was fit to burst out of her chest.

“Don’t call Osiris dumb,” she said again.

“How are you gonna make me?” the boy sneered.

Akiara clenched her hands into fists.  She shook slightly. She could feel Takako staring at her — Takako, so small and scared and worried.  Just like Akiara had been. Just like Akiara still was. 

But she wouldn’t give up.

“I’ll duel you,” she said.  “You can’t call us dumb if we keep beating you.”

The girl practically shrieked with laughter.

“Oh my god!  What a threat!” she said.  “How about right here, right now?  Against both of us?”

“Fine,” Akiara said.  “That’s fine.”

“Wait!”

Takako’s voice was thin and nervous, but still carried.  Everyone glanced at her, and for a moment, she looked like she would faint.

“I-I’ll duel too,” she said.  “We’ll tag duel you.”

“They’ll drown each other,” the boy said with a sneer.  “Meet you on the field in five.”

The two spun around and stalked off, almost in synch.  Akiara’s chest was still thrumming with panic.

Theoretically, they had an opening now.  They could just go back home and leave them waiting at the duel field.

But then they’d just double down, and call them cowards, too.  And Akiara...Akiara didn’t want to be a coward anymore.

“I’m sorry,” Takako said, gasping.  “I shouldn’t have said that! I’ll just hold you back!”

Akiara looked at Takako.  Then she straightened her shoulders, and tightened her hands.  She reached for Takako’s hands and held them. Takako looked at her with wide eyes.

“No you won’t,” Akiara said.  “Now let’s take a minute and compare decks.”

* * *

“Can’t believe you actually showed up!” the girl said, snickering.

Akiara felt like running away, but she didn’t.  Takako needed her to stay where she was. She climbed up the stairs, Takako scurrying behind her.

_ “The truth is,” Takako had said.  “I’m not very good at dueling. Or anything.” _

_ “That’s okay,” Akiara said.  “I’m not either. But we’ll work through it together, and with our monsters.” _

Akiara took up a spot on one side of the tag duel field, and Takako on the other.

“Are you going to run off the field crying when we win?” the boy said.  “Your brother said that that’s what you did at your last tournament.”

Takako closed her eyes, and tried to breathe softly.

“We’ll play with shared field rules,” the girl said.  “We share a field, life points, and graveyards. You can attack using your partner’s monsters, but you can’t attack someone directly if their partner has monsters on the field.”

“That’s fair,” Akiara said.

_ “My big brother is Inoue Kaoru,” Takako said.  “The Inoue family...we’re a rich business family, with a lot of money in dueling.  My brother’s a third-year, but he’s already set for a pro career. He thinks my cards are dumb and weak.” _

_ Akiara flipped through her cards. _

_ “I think your cards are yours,” she said.  “And you should be proud of them. They’ll take care of you if you let them.” _

“I’ll go first,” the girl said.  “I summon Battle Ox in attack mode!”

Takako flinched when she saw the big monster rise up onto the field, its ax gleaming.  Akiara looked to Takako, and Takako jumped.

“I’ll go next,” she said.  “I-I summon Shinobird Crow.”

A dark-colored being with the head of a crow and a long cloak of black feathers rose up in front of Takako.

“Zero attack?” the boy laughed.  “No wonder you suck!”

Takako squeezed her eyes shut, and Akiara stared at the boy until he looked uncomfortable.  

“I equip Crow with the Mirror of Yata, so that it doesn’t go back to my hand at the end of the turn,” Takako mumbled.  “Turn end.”

The boy snorted, and took his turn.

“I summon Marauding Captain!  When he’s summoned, I can special summon another level four or lower monster from my hand!  I summon Gene Warped Warwolf!”

The next two monsters appeared, and Akiara bit back a yelp at the giant anthropomorphic white wolf that snarled at her.  

“You’re lucky I can’t attack yet,” the boy sneered.

“My turn,” Akiara said.  She hesitated with her fingers on the cards.  This might be a bad idea, she thought. It might backfire on her.  But...

She swallowed.  Her deck felt warm.  Her cards wouldn’t betray her.  She was sure of it.

“What if we...um...make this a game,” she said.  Her power bubbled in her chest, and although invisible, she could tell that the others could sense it.  The boy blinked, and the girl frowned, as her power unfolded beneath her feet and encased the field over them.  “If we win, um...you start giving Osiris a chance, and stop making fun of them.”

“And what if  _ we _ win?” the girl said, grinning.

Akiara’s stomach twisted.  This was where it could backfire.  A shadow game was dangerous, and Yuki-sensei and Hibiki-sensei would definitely scold her if they found out she was casting one on her opponents.

“What do you want?” she said.

“If we win, you have to tell everyone that you’re a loser,” the boy said.

“That’s stupid,” said the girl.

But Akiara had already accepted the conditions into her game.  She nodded. The rules would be simple, since it was a simple shadow game.  The monsters would be real, and so would the damage, but she’d halve that for Takako’s sake.  And she wouldn’t steal any souls. That wasn’t the condition.

“Okay.  That’s fine.”

“Just take your turn!” the girl said, looking suddenly winded.  The shadow game was rough for some people to handle. She let up a little bit on the intensity.  This was hard.

Akiara drew.  She looked at her hand.

“I set one monster face down, set two cards face down, and end my turn.”

“What a lame turn!” the girl said with a laugh.  “We’re going to win so hard. My turn!”

She drew and grinned at her card.

“I activate the magic card Polymerization!” she said.  “I fuse Battle Ox with the Mystic Horseman in my hand to summon Rabid Horseman!”

The world pinched and swirled, and there was a sudden feeling of pressure crushing down on them.  It was a shadow game after all, Akiara thought. The monsters were suddenly very real. The girl looked surprised as she stepped back from her ox centaur monster, clearly surprised at how real it was.  Akiara could actually smell it, and her nose wrinkled.

“Rabid Horseman!  Attack that stupid zero attack monster!”

Akiara’s eyes shot to Takako.  She looked frozen. She stared at the charging monster like it was about to run her over for real.

“Takako-chan,” Akiara said.  “It’s going to be okay.”

Takako’s eyes shot to Akiara.  Then she looked at her monster.  She blinked back tears, and shook off the paralyzation.

“Shinobird Crow’s effect activates,” she said.  “When it’s attacked, I can discard a spirit monster from my hand, and Crow gains that much attack.  I discard Shinobaroness Peacock from my hand.”

A ghostly image of a beautiful woman in a dress made of peacock feathers appeared superimposed over Shinobird Crow.  Rabid Horseman’s ax shattered on impact with the ghostly form, and then the ghost princess and its crow vessel struck back, cutting the centaur down with a sharp peacock feather fan.

“What the hell?  You had something like that planned?”

Takako had a bit more color to her cheeks all of a sudden.  The ghost princess faded, leaving Shinobird Crow alone with only its mirror.

“My turn,” Takako said.  “I activate a spell card: Shinobird’s Calling.  By tributing monsters on my field and from my hand, I can Ritual summon.”

The boy and the girl both swore, and Akiara found herself smiling.  Takako’s voice was getting stronger and stronger with every word she said.

“Great king from the other side of the stars, cross the bridge before you and meet the earth below,” Takako chanted.  “Ritual Summon! Appear, Shinobaron Peacock!”

Feathers and starlight flew over the field, setting the stage in an array of light and smoke.  Akiara’s shadow game reacted to the flurry of magic, stars lighting up in the thin haze of shadow she’d built around them.  Oh, Akiara breathed. Takako’s monsters were so pretty!

The young man stood before them in a shining ensemble of peacock feathers, holding out his fan before him with a stern look in his eyes.  Takako seemed to be shining brilliantly, too, her eyes alight with excitement. Akiara smiled. It was the first time she’d seen Takako smile like that, or smile at all.

“When Shinobaron Peacock is summoned, I can return up to three monsters on the field to their owner’s hands,” Takako said.  “I’m sending your two monsters back to your hand!”

The boy swore.  Shinobaron Peacock stood tall and proud, like a king.  He pointed his fan out imperiously, and immediately, Marauding Captain and Gene Warped Warwolf faltered, and then turned to light.  The cards flew back into the boy’s hand.

“Shinobaron Peacock!  Attack directly!”

Shinobaron Peacock raised his fan over his head this time.  A sound like a bell chimed over the field, and then the star field that surrounded them swirled up to meet his fan.  He swiped it down, and a river of stars rushed the boy and the girl. They both yelped — probably feeling the static shocks from Akiara’s weak shadow game.

“That’s the end of my turn,” Takako said.  “And at the end of my turn, Shinobaron Peacock returns to my hand.”

The baron bowed, and then he turned to mist.  The mist dissipated, and Takako replaced the card in her hand.  The Obelisk boy swore as he stood back up, looking fighting mad.

“You just left yourself wide open!” he said.  “All she’s got is a puny defense position monster!”

“You might have done a lot of damage, but don’t think you’ve won already,” the girl snapped.

“My turn,” said the boy.  “I’m resummoning my Marauding Captain, and with it, my Gene Warped Warwolf!  And then my Warwolf will attack your face down monster!”

“Before your Battle Phase, I activate my face down card,” said Akiara.  “Book of Taiyou — I can flip up one set monster.”

“What the hell good’s that gonna do?” the boy snapped.

“I flip up my monster, Crystron Quan,” Akiara said.

Her tiny, crystalline monster hopped up as its card flipped over, making a chinging sort of noise and letting off excited glimmers from its crystals.  The boy laughed.

“That monster only has five hundred attack!  You would have missed some damage if you’d left it face down.”

“Crystron Quan’s effect,” said Akiara.  She was surprised at how little her voice was shaking.  “During my opponent’s main or battle phase I can special summon a non-Tuner monster from my hand, but it has its effects negated.”

The girl looked like she was getting ready to say something along the lines of ‘what good is that going to do’ but then she snapped her mouth shut.  Her eyes were fixed on Akiara, and Akiara couldn’t tell if the look was hateful or not.

“I special summon Crystron Smiger,” Akiara said.

Her monster joined Quan on the field, a beautiful metallic and crystalline white tiger who lashed its tail back and forth.

“Warwolf will still attack!” the boy said.

“Quan’s effect isn’t done — when I special summon, I can immediately perform a Synchro Summon using Quan and the special summoned monster.”

The boy’s eyes widened.  Akiara pointed to her monsters, and Quan became a glowing green gate, while Smiger dove into it and became stars.  Takako let out a gasp of awe.

“I Synchro summon Crystron Quandax!”

Her monster flew free of the Synchro gates.  She could feel the shiver of its presence — it looked a lot like a white power ranger, with hints of Smiger’s white and gold striped armor.

The boy laughed.

“You did all that just to summon a monster with eighteen hundred attack?  Warwolf is still higher!”

“Shut up, Sam!” the girl said suddenly, still staring at Akiara.

“I activate my trap card, Crystron Impact,” Akiara said, pushing the button.  Her heart was racing now. With the shadow game in play, she could feel Quandrax’s excitement — could hear it like the hum of a finger running around the edge of a glass.  “I can special summon two tuners, one from my graveyard and one from my hand. I special summon Crystron Quan and Crystron Rion.”

The two tiny tuners burst back onto the field, chittering, Quan spinning excitedly around Rion.

“And then Quandax’s effect,” Akiara said.  “During your main or battle phase, I can Synchro summon again, using Quandax and my two tuners on the field!”

“Two tuners?” the boy said, mouth dropping open.

Akiara felt a sparkle running through her all of a sudden — this was...actually fun!  She was dueling, and she was having fun! She was actually doing well!!

“Go, Tanaka-chan!” Takako said, punching the air and sounding alight with excitement.

“Synchro summon!” Akiara called, as the light faded and her new monster appeared.  “Crystron Quariongandrax!”

A golden monster burst into the field, huge and only vaguely human in shape, with big golden-green wings that glowed at its back.

“When Quariongandrax is summoned, I can banish monsters on my opponent’s field up to the number of materials used for its summon, which was three.  So I’m banishing both your monsters!”

Quariongandrax roared, and the two monsters on the other side of the field immediately disappeared in a shatter of glass.  Only Quariongandrax remained, glowing and whipping its tail back and forth, waiting for its opponents to make a move.

The two simply stared at it for a long time.

“Fuck this,” the girl said.  “They won, Sam.”

She put her hand on top of her deck, surrendering.  As though in a dream, Sam copied her. Akiara felt the threads of her shadow game dissipating, and with in Quariongandrax and its light faded too.  Akiara felt a little less strong all of a sudden.

Sam turned, and jumped down from the field.  He walked away without another word. Akiara felt a sudden explosion of relief burst through her.  She’d...they’d...they’d won.

“Tanaka-chan!”

Takako flung herself at Akiara, crying and blubbering again.  Akiara almost fell over when the girl hugged her, but she managed to keep her feet.  She awkwardly patted Takako’s hands.

She was so dizzy with relief at winning that for a moment, she didn’t even notice that the girl was still there.  She was still standing on the other side of the field, looking at them.

“What?” Akiara said, voice trembling slightly.

The girl actually...smiled.  It was more of a smirk, really, but it was something.

“Damn,” she said finally, shaking her head.  “I guess we really were wrong.”

She saluted them both with two fingers, and turned to hop off the field.  She paused for a moment before walking away.

“My name’s Madison,” she said.  “Madison Green.”

She glanced over her shoulder, and smirked again.

“You have interesting cards,” she said.

And then she finally walked away, leaving Takako and Akiara alone on the field.  Takako was still hanging all over Akiara, and Akiara just let her. She was still dizzy with relief at having won.  And wow. She’d run a shadow game without actually hurting anyone. And those two would definitely leave them alone now.

Takako sniffled, still clinging to Akiara.

“Thank you,” she said.  “Thank you for helping me.”

Akiara patted her arm, in too much of an awkward position to hug her back.

“I think I was helping me, too,” she said.  And she smiled. And it felt really good.


	10. The Sweet Smile!! - The Convulsion of Nature Activates!

Miu yawned.  It was too early to be awake.  She stumbled into the mess hall, bleary and grumpy.  Mewfeuille had been sleeping on her face, and it had been so warm and cozy.  And Mewfeuille was still sleeping on Miu’s very warm bed. How annoying. How come Miu had to go to class and Duel Spirits didn’t?  It wasn’t fair.

She was annoyed further by the sounds of giggling and tapping feet in the mess hall.  It was too early for people to be noisy. What was all the commotion, anyway? Miu glared in the direction of it, finding that one of the tables in the middle was almost full.

“Where’d you get this ribbon?”

“My mom gave it to me as a present for getting into Duel Academia!”

Morgan was playing with the ribbon of a first-year girl that Miu only half remembered.  The girl was small, about Miu’s height, with slightly tanned skin and blond hair in big pigtails with pink ribbons.  She had her hands on the table, and her sleeves were so big that they draped over her hands. Miu pushed her own too big sleeves up self consciously.

Anani sat on the other side of the table with her head resting in her hands, and Ren was sitting on the other side of the girl.  Even Reina was hanging out next to Anani. Miu walked over to the head of the table, and everyone looked up.

“What’s going on?” Miu said.  “Why are you in the upperclassmen mess hall?”

The girl’s eyes got really huge.

“Oh no,” she said.  “Am I not supposed to be?”

“There’s not a rule against it,” Anani said.  “Keiko-chan just came to say hi.”

“Not a rule against it,” said Reina.

Miu blinked at the girl, Keiko, and Keiko blinked back.

“Okay,” Miu said.  “But why are you all so noisy?”

“Were we noisy?  Sorry,” Ren said.  “We were talking about families.  Keiko’s got almost as many brothers as I have sisters.”

“All my big brothers are so mean,” Keiko said, pouting and folding her arms.  She immediately got bright and cheerful again, throwing her arms around Ren in a hug. “Not like you, oniichan!  I wish you were my big brother.”

Ren chuckled, patting her on the head.

“Isn’t she just a doll?” Morgan said, cooing as though she were some cute cat.

Miu stared at Keiko.  She was so noisy. Ugh.  Miu hated noisy.

“Are you going to introduce yourself?” Anani asked, looking at Miu.  “We are her senpai after all.”

“No,” Miu said.  “Miu doesn’t care about being a senpai. Miu is going to get breakfast.”

Miu turned and walked away.  She heard Anani hurriedly comforting Keiko, assuring her that Miu was always so abrupt and blunt.  Miu rolled her eyes. Honestly. What was she going to do if not everyone immediately jumped to be nice to her?

Miu got a tray and filled up from the cafeteria line with some omelettes and soup.  She found a table as far away from the noisy one as possible, and started to eat. They were still laughing and giggling over there, and she tried not to growl.  Maybe she would take her food back to her room.

She glanced back up at the table, and was surprised to see that Keiko was looking back at her.  She wasn’t making any sort of happy or sad face at that moment — just staring at Miu with unblinking eyes.

And then she smiled.  And Miu felt like it wasn’t a very nice smile.  Keiko turned back to face her new little group and started chattering again.  Miu stared at the back of her head. She shrugged, and went back to eating. Maybe she’d imagined it.

* * *

“Ueno-san, what’s this supposed to be?”

Miu blinked, turning back from Saki, who she’d just been about to leave class with.  Chronos-sensei was frowning at her, holding out a sheaf of papers. Miu looked at it for a moment.  It was an essay, she saw. And the page it was open to.... Oh. Someone had drawn a very unflattering picture of Chronos-sensei on it.

“Miu doesn’t know,” Miu said, looking back at him.  “It’s not Miu’s.”

“It’s got your name on it,” Chronos said, shaking it at her.  “This is your signature, is it not, na no ne?”

Miu stared.  That... _was_ her signature.  And it _was_ her essay that she was supposed to turn in today.

“Miu didn’t draw that,” Miu said.  “Miu’s drawings aren’t recognizable.”

“But you turned it in, did you not, na no ne??” Chronos said, getting more and more heated.  He looked like he was about to blow smoke out of his ears.

“Sensei, I don’t think Miu would ever do something like this,” Saki said quickly, coming to her defense.  “She’s not that kind of person!”

“Then who did, na no ne?  Who would have stolen Ueno-san’s paper just to draw this?”

“Miu doesn’t know,” Miu said.  People were staring even though the lecture hall was nearly empty.  She felt horrible, her cheeks burning. “Miu is sorry. Miu will redo it.”

“See that you do,” Chronos said, huffing.

Miu took the paper back and Chronos turned around, storming back towards his desk.  Miu stared at the drawing. It was actually kind of funny, but she definitely hadn’t drawn it.  Her essay had been pristine yesterday when she’d printed it out. Who would have had time to draw something on it?  Hm. She had dozed off for a bit over the printer for a few moments before she’d stapled it. Keiko had had to push her to wake her up so she could use the printer.

“Who would have done something like this?” Saki said, leaning in to see.  “Do you think it’s another Obelisk prank?”

Miu shrugged.  She put the essay back into her bag.  She’d figure it out later.

* * *

“Miu!!  Would you pick up your stuff??”

Miu didn’t look up from her game.  She was really close to a one hundred percent combo on this song.

“Hey!  Listen to me!!”

Nina grabbed Miu’s phone and pushed it down.  Miu fumbled the last note on the song. She stared at the the 99% that flashed over the screen for a moment.  Then she looked up, glowering at Nina. Her hair was wrapped up in a towel and she was in a very fluffy looking robe that was decorated with cartoon Blue Eyes White Dragons.

“What do you _want_ ,” Miu said.

Nina shoved a shampoo bottle into her face.

“Your whole shampoo bottle was dumped onto the shower head!  I got hit with a whole faceful of Birthday Cake scent when I turned it on!”

Miu frowned, her brows wrinkling and her ire at the game fading.

“But Miu’s shampoo is...”

Her eyes wandered to her closet.  She frowned. It was still closed.  She got up and walked over to it, opening the doors.  Her bath basket was there, and...and her shampoo was missing.

“Miu didn’t leave it in the bathroom,” Miu said, frowning.

“Well, it was there!!  And you left a mess all over the shower!  How do you even spread the shampoo that far?”

Miu frowned deeper.  This was weird.

“But Miu didn’t do that,” she said.

“You’re the only one with this shampoo,” Nina said, shaking the bottle at her again.  “And — ”

She stopped, hesitating at the look on Miu’s face.  Nina held up both hands then, the shampoo bottle still in one of them.

“H-hey.  I mean, I’m not really mad.  Just make sure you put it away next time.”

“Miu _did_!” Miu said, frustrated.  “Maybe it was the bathroom ghost.”

Miu hated how Nina didn’t even look excited by the idea.  She still looked at Miu like she thought Miu had left the mess.  Miu’s hands rolled up into fists.

“Sorry,” she mumbled.  “Miu will watch out better next time.”

* * *

“Miu, what’s going on?”

Miu looked up blankly.  She frowned at Anani’s slightly pink, almost red coloring in her cheeks.  Flecks of green shimmered over her forehead and down her neck for a moment, too.  She looked really upset.

“What’s wrong?” Miu said.

Anani wordlessly showed her a post-it note.  Miu read it. Her stomach twisted. _“You’re so ugly.  Wear regular colors.”_ It...looked like Miu’s handwriting.

She looked up at Anani with wide eyes

“Miu didn’t write this,” Miu said desperately.  “Miu promises!”

Anani’s coloring faded back to white.  She sighed, crumpling note.

“I know you wouldn’t,” she said, though it was clear from her tone that she had, in fact, thought for at least a moment that it was Miu.  “But why would someone say something like this?”

Miu felt tears bubbling in her eyes.  Why were so many awful things happening to her lately?

“Miu is sorry,” she said in a very small voice.

Anani just waved a distant hand, looking very far away.  Miu felt like crying. She wanted to say something — like, whoever had written that note was wrong.  Anani was very pretty, no matter what color she wore. But she felt like anything she said would just fall flat.  So she just stayed silent. Who would do things like this? Who would...

Miu felt something click.

 _Keiko_.

* * *

She really had no reason to believe that Keiko would be trying to harass her.   What reason would Keiko have to do such a thing? But it was the only thing she could think of.

She knocked lightly on the door to Keiko’s room.  Funnily enough, it was the same room she’d lived in with Saki last year.  She’d asked Yuki-sensei where Keiko lived, saying it was for a school project.  She had a feeling he knew it was something else, but he’d told her.

She waited a few moments.  She was about to knock again when the door opened with a snap.

It wasn’t Keiko — it must be her roommate.  Oh, Miu thought. It was Haruka, the girl from that day with the Obelisk fight.  Haruka stared down at her for a moment. Then she scowled.

“What do you want?” she said.

“Miu wants to talk to Keiko-san,” she said.  “Is she in?”

“She left a while ago.”

“Where?”

“I don’t fucking know.  Don’t talk to me.”

She slammed the door in Miu’s face.  Miu stared at it for a moment. What a prickly person.  She turned away, then, thinking about where Keiko might have gone.

She suddenly caught sight of Keiko then, skipping along back towards the dorm.  She had a popsicle in her mouth. She’d probably just come from the snack bar.

“Keiko-san,” Miu called, walking down the stairs.

Keiko looked up.  Her eyes lit up to see Miu, which surprised Miu enough to pause at the bottom of the stairs.

“Mimi-chan!” Keiko said, running up to her.  “What are you doing here?”

Miu blinked and stared at her.

“Don’t call Miu that,” she said.

“Aww, why not?  It’s cute, isn’t it?”

“It’s not Miu’s name,” Miu said, already starting to feel cross.

“Oh well,” said Keiko.  She sucked on her popsicle for a moment, and then smiled and pointed it at Miu.  “What did you need?”

Miu frowned, hesitating.  Keiko really did seem pretty nice.  Annoyingly cheerful and nice. How did she ask something like that?

“Miu wants to know if Keiko....is mad at Miu.”

Keiko looked at her with such bright, shiny eyes.

“Why would I be mad?” she said brightly.  “I love everybody!”

Miu frowned.  Maybe she’d been wrong.  Still, something made her feel a little...uncomfortable.  She wasn’t ready to let go of her theory yet. Actually...hadn’t Keiko been the one to wake her up at the printer the other day?

She looked down at Mewfeuille at her feet.  The cat yawned. She bent down to pick him up, cuddling him in her arms.  Keiko looked confused — that was right, she wasn’t a spirit seer, so she couldn’t see Mewfeuille.

“Mewfeuille,” Miu said.  “Did you see who took Miu’s shampoo?”

Mewfeuille yawned.  Then he opened his sleepy eyes, and stared straight at Keiko.  He meowed, pawing at Miu’s arm.

Miu looked at Keiko.  Keiko’s eyes were shaded by her bangs now, and she was still sucking on her popsicle.

“Well?” Miu said.  “Did you take Miu’s shampoo?”

“Aw, darn,” Keiko said.  “I forgot you had a spirit friend.”

She looked up and smiled brightly at Miu.

“Yup!  I did!” she said.  “And I drew on your essay, and left that note for Anani-senpai! What do you think?  My handwriting forgery is really good, huh?”

Miu’s arms tightened around Mewfeuille.  She felt...she wasn’t sure yet. She didn’t feel very strongly about a lot of things very often.  She thought this was probably what it felt like.

“Why?”

Keiko giggled.

“Cause you were mean to me,” she said.

“Miu was sleepy.  They told you not to take it personally.”

Keiko shrugged.

“It was fun, though,” she said.  “Isn’t that a good enough reason?”

Miu felt very, very strange.  Her head was a little dizzy. Mewfeuille meowed plantively from how tightly Miu was holding him.

“Miu wouldn’t care about the other things,” Miu said slowly.  “But you made Anani feel bad.”

Keiko stuck out her bottom lip at her.

“What?  It’s true though, isn’t it?  She looks so weird!”

Oh.  This is what it felt like to be really mad.

Miu dropped Mewfeuille, and shoved out with both hands.  Keiko yelped. Her popsicle flew from her hands, and she went tumbling into the dirt.  For a moment, she stared up at Miu with wide, shocked eyes. Then her gaze flicker.

And on a dime, she started to sob.

“T-That was so m-mean!” she said.  “W-why did you d-do that?”

Miu was going to answer, but then she heard someone else’s feet running over to them.

“Hey!! What’s the big idea?”

Ren ran over to them.  He looked between Miu and Keiko with a surprised, wide-eyed look.  Keiko pointed at Miu with a shaking hand.

“S-She p-pushed me!” Keiko cried.  “And she m-made me lose my popsicle!”

“Miu, what the heck?” Ren said.

“That’s not it!” Miu said.  “I mean — Ren-senpai. Keiko said —”

“I don’t care what she said; why are you going around shoving people?” Ren said.  “Hey, Keiko, come on. I’ll take you back to your dorm.”

Keiko’s lip trembled, and she held her arms out like she expected Ren to pick her up.  Probably because he was used to little sisters, he did so almost automatically, scooping her up.  Keiko looked over her shoulder at Miu and grinned through her crocodile tears.

Miu wanted to shout something at her, but clearly, Ren wasn’t going to listen.  Her hands tightened.

She’d need to find another way to win with Keiko.

*

Miu paced her room, thinking hard.  How could she prove that Keiko was the one doing all this without someone getting mad at her?  Keiko was really good at this game. Who could she tell, anyway? They all seemed to like Keiko.  If Miu said something else, she’d look like a bully.

“Miu?  You okay?”

Saki looked up from her book.  Miu stopped in the middle of the carpet.  Angel rubbed up against her feet. Miu glanced at Saki, wondering.  Would Saki believe her? They’d been friends for a while now. Would she believe Miu, or Keiko?”

Miu’s stomach twisted.  She hated this. Keiko had done some pretty mean things, but what was even worse was how she’d made her feel like she couldn’t even trust her friends, afraid they might turn on her.

Saki frowned at the look on Miu’s face, putting her book down without even putting a bookmark in it.  She shifted to the end of the bed and patted the spot next to her.

“Hey,” she said.  “Come here. Something’s wrong, right?  You never make a face like that.”

Miu felt like she was going to cry.  How could she distrust that Saki would stick up for her?  Saki was her best friend. Miu collapsed onto the bed next to Saki, falling against her shoulder.  Saki immediately wrapped her arm around Miu.

“What’s up?” she said softly.

“Miu’s in a pickle,” Miu mumbled.  “Something bad happened.”

“What?”

“Miu got Keiko mad.  And now Keiko is bullying Miu.”

Saki paused.  Miu looked at her, worried she’d see disbelief there.  Instead, she only saw surprise.

“Really?  Keiko?” Saki said.  Then she frowned. “Actually, no, yeah.  She seems the type.”

“Really??” Miu said, shooting straight up.

Saki shrugged, and then she smiled at Miu.

“If you say so, Miu, then I’ll believe you,” she said.  “What did she do?”

Miu dumped the whole story, up to the point where she’d shoved Keiko.  Saki looked horrified.

“How could she say something like that to Anani?” she said.  “That’s like — the worst thing you could say to her!”

“Miu knows,” Miu said miserably.  “And Anani thinks Miu said something like that.”

“We have to tell everyone the truth,” Saki said indignantly.  “They’ll believe you!”

“They didn’t before,” Miu said doubtfully.

Saki deflated.  She had a look on her face that said “well...yeah, you’re right.”  She frowned, rubbing her chin in thought.

And then her eyes lit up, and she snapped her fingers.

“I’ve got it!  Miu! I know how to make it work!”

* * *

Keiko stared at Miu, blinking.  Miu waited. The lecture hall was nearly empty, and Keiko clearly hadn’t expected to see Miu in her class.  She glanced around, as though looking for one of her blind bodyguards that she could stick up for her.

“Miu isn’t here to fight,” Miu said.  “Miu wants to play a game.”

Keiko’s eyes shot back to her, then.  Curiosity sparkled in her eyes.

“Oh?” she said, smiling.  “A game?”

“Mmhm.  You’re a shadow gamer, right?”

“Yup,” said Keiko, looking very pleased.  “You mean, you want to play a shadow game??”

Miu nodded.  Keiko squealed, clapping her hands.

“Oh my gosh!  I have just the game!  Oh, but...”

She hesitated, tapping her finger to her lips.

“What do you want to win from it?” she said slyly.

“If Miu wins,” Miu said.  “You have to tell everyone the truth about what you did to Miu, and you have to apologize to Anani.”

Keiko snickered behind her hair, still looking remarkably excited.

“Great!” she said.  “But if I win...you have to do whatever I tell you for the rest of the year!”

Miu winced.  She sort of expected some kind of stupid childish thing like that.  And being Keiko’s servant seemed like a pain the in butt. But she didn’t plan on losing.  So she nodded.

“That’s fair.”

“Perfect!” Keiko said, clapping her hands again.  “Let’s play!”

She plopped into her seat, and gestured for Miu to take the seat next to her.  Miu sat down cautiously. The lecture hall was empty now. Keiko closed her eyes, and then, suddenly, the room seemed to get darker.

“Put your cards on the table,” Keiko said.  “And shuffle all of your cards together. Including your Extra Deck."

How odd.  Miu took her cards from their box, and shuffled them together with her Extra Deck.  Keiko shuffled her deck too, and put it on the table next to her. Miu copied.

“This is how the game works,” Keiko said.  “You have to guess what’s on top of your deck.  If you guess right, you can activate that effect right away if it’s possible to, or you can save it to activate it when it’s appropriate.  You don’t have to obey summoning rules for monsters. So if you guess you have a Fusion monster and you’re right, you can summon it!”

She smiled brightly.

“But,” she said.  “You can only have one monster on the field at a time.  If you guess a monster right, you can choose to replace it with the one on your field.  We both have two thousand life points. First to zero, or to run out of cards, loses.”

“It’s a strange game,” Miu said doubtfully.

“Yup!  I made it up,” Keiko said with a giggle.  

“What if you guess wrong?”

“Then you discard it to the Graveyard, but its effects don’t activate.  Oh, but if you draw something that can effect the Graveyard, you can get those cards then!” Keiko said.  “I’ll go first, so you can figure out how it works.”

She closed her eyes, putting her hand on top of her deck.

“I guess...that I have Watapon!”

She drew the top card.  Then she frowned, sighing.

“Wrong,” she said with a sigh.  “I have to discard my cute little Poki Dragon.”

She placed the card to her side, and then smiled at Miu.

“Your turn to guess!”

Miu frowned.  The game made sense but...it was a one in forty chance to get it right.  Less, with the Extra Deck included. Well...if you knew your cards well, the less cards you had left, the better you could make a guess based on what you’d lost.  So it was a game of perseverance.

She bit her lip, thinking.

“I guess....Madolche Messengelato.”

She turned over her card.  Wrong. It was Mewfeuille. She reluctantly discarded.

“My turn, my turn!” Keiko said.  “My guess is...Spell Locker!”

She turned the card over, and squealed with delight.

“I was right!” she said.  “I can activate it now! This card makes it so that spells can only affect the person who activates them!”

She put the card on the table, and immediately, a thick field of static filled the room.  Miu could taste it at the back of her throat. What a weird card, she thought. That meant you couldn’t use spells to attack your opponent.

“I guess...Madolche Hootcakes.”

She turned her card over.  Wrong again; it was Baaple.  She discarded it.

“I guess that my next one is...Gellenduo!”

Keiko made a face when she was wrong, discarding her Despell instead.  Miu took another turn and missed again. Keiko missed her next turn, too, and then Miu missed again.

“This is a boring game,” Miu said.

“Nuh-uh,” Keiko said.  “It gets really interesting later, I promise!”

She squeezed her eyes shut and thought.

“I guess...Convulsion of Nature!”

What kind of card was that?  She drew her card. Her whole face lit up.

“I was right!” she said.  “I play Convulsion of Nature!”

Immediately, their surrounding changed.  Miu gasped. They were still sitting at the same table, but it was hovering the middle of a maelstrom.  Behind her, a waterspout spun furiously. To her left, a volcano was erupting, and to her right, a tornado roared.  Behind Keiko, a wildfire fought with a tsunami. Keiko rested her cheek on her fist, grinning.

“When this card is in play, both players turn their decks face up,” Keiko said. “Only, I’ve got Spell Locker on too.  Which means, this spell only effects me!”

She flipped her deck upside down, and Miu’s eyes widened as she realized what that meant.  Keiko would be able to guess because she could see her cards!

“You turn,” she said sweetly.

Miu had to get something, quick!  Keiko had a monster on top of her deck.

“I guess Madolche Chouxvalier!” Miu said.  She flipped it over — no! It was Puddingcess!

“Too bad,” Keiko said.  “My turn to guess. Oh my gosh, I wonder what it will be!”

She laughed.

“I guess that my next card is Binding Chain!” she said.  “And oh look! It is!”

She took the card off the top.

“I can summon it!” she said.  “And since you have no monsters, I can attack you directly!”

A dark, shadowy monster appeared behind Keiko, with glowing golden chains around its hands and waist.  Miu gasped when the shadow passed through her, making her feel cold and slimy. Keiko giggled.

“Come on,” she said.  “Try to think. You can get a monster, right?  At least to hang on for a bit longer.”

Miu’s hand trembled.  She put her hand over her deck, fingers shaking.  Binding Chain would end her next turn if she didn’t draw something.  But what if her top card was a spell she couldn’t use? Or she guessed wrong anyway?  She’d have to do whatever Keiko said, and Keiko would probably make her do something mean.

Miu thought about the sad, distant look in Anani’s eyes.  The way she’d drawn away, looking so lonely.

Miu grabbed her wrist, holding it steady.  She sucked in, and out.

“Miu won’t lose,” she said.  “Miu trusts her cards.”

Keiko giggled.

“Okay, show me,” she said.

Miu closed her eyes.

 _Everyone,_ she thought. _Are you there?_

She felt them.  The clustered around her, invisible, but very real.  She felt the soft head of Mewfeuille on her knee, and the hand of Messengelato on top of hers, Puddingcess sitting neatly on her shoulders.  She heard Hootcakes hooting, and Baaple baaing. Her friends, her oldest friends, the ones she’d known as long as she’d been alive. They wouldn’t abandon her.

And she wouldn’t abandon her friends, either.

“Keiko-san,” Miu said.  “There’s one thing Miu think you messed up.”

“Oh?  What’s that?”

Miu inhaled once.

“Osiris Red is a family,” she said.  “And not the kind of family that you can make squabble and fight.  It’s a stronger family than that. It’s one that never lets you down.”

She opened her eyes, and looked into Keiko’s.  For the first time, Keiko looked uneasy.

“And it’s your family too,” Miu said.  “So Miu isn’t going to let you win, and ruin that family anymore.”

She inhaled again, and exhaled.  She could sense the shiver down her arm.  She knew exactly what monster was on top of her deck.

“I guess that my next monster is Madolche Queen Tiaramisu,” she said.

She turned the card over slowly, watching Keiko’s face go pale.

Sure enough, there she was.  The beautiful black card glowed at her, the queen smiling.

“I summon her to the field,” Miu said.  “And I use her effect. I can shuffle two Madolche cards in the graveyard back into my deck to shuffle two cards on your side of the field back into yours.”

Her queen appeared beside her, rising up out of her candy throne.  The little queen smiled and pointed her scepter across the field.

“Miu gets rid of Binding Chain and Convulsion of Nature,” Miu said.

Keiko squeaked, as all around them, the natural disasters winked out one by one, leaving them back in an ordinary classroom again.  Binding Chain make a rattling sound, and then the mist sucked back into the deck.

“Madolche Queen Tiaramisu will attack directly,” Miu said.  “And then Miu wins.”

Tiaramisu raised her scepter.  And then she rapped Keiko lightly on the head with it.  Keiko squealed and grabbed her head.

The shadow game faded from around them.  The static dissipated. Miu looked up at Tiaramisu just before she vanished.  The little queen smiled at her. She looked proud. Miu smiled back.

Keiko let out an angry whine.

“No fair!” she said, banging her head against the desk.  “I never lose that game! How did you win?”

“Because Miu has friends Miu can rely on,” Miu said softly.

Keiko glared up at her through her bangs.  Then she let out a long groan, flopping backwards over the back of her chair.

“Fine,” she said.  “I lost! I have to do what you said.  I’ll tell everyone the truth, and apologize.”

She blinked and looked back up at Miu when Miu extended her hand towards her.

“Miu meant it when Miu said this is your family too,” she said.  

Keiko squinted her eyes at Miu.

“They’re not going to like me anymore when I tell them the truth,” she said.  “So I think that’s over with.”

Miu shrugged.

“Sometimes we do mean things to family.  But then we say sorry. And things get better again.”

Keiko stared at Miu’s hand.  Then she huffed, jumping up to her feet without taking it.

“Let me get this over with,” she said.

She scooped up her cards and scurried away.  Miu watched her go. Well, no one could say she didn’t try.

But Keiko hesitated in the doorway.  She didn’t turned around, still hugging her cards to her chest.

“If everyone hates me after this,” Keiko said.  “You’d better not suddenly take that hand of yours away.”

And then she was gone.  Miu stared after her. Then she sighed.

“What a pain,” she said.  

Then she stared off after Keiko.  She felt a bit of a smile coming on in spite of herself.

“What a pain,” she repeated.


	11. Mi-Gyeong's Quest!! - How to be a Superhero!

Mi-Gyeong plugged her headphones into her phone, bouncing from foot to foot.  She hit play. Immediately, too loud music exploded out of her earbuds, and she squealed, yanking them out of her ears and fumbling to turn it off.

She blushed as Harue groaned in his sleep.  

“Sorry,” she hissed when Harue blinked once, squinting at her.  

He just smiled sleepily from the top bunk and waved a hand.

“You’re better than an alarm clock,” he said, making her blush again.  “Going for a run?”

“Yup!” Mi-Gyeong said.  “Gotta be strong if I’m gonna be a superhero!”

Harue waved his hand sleepily again, and Mi-Gyeong whispered another apology.  Then she slipped out the door and onto the balcony, and headed down the stairs.  

Duel Academia was pretty at dawn.  The island was positioned just right so that when the sun came up over the ocean, it seemed to make everything glow.  An ocean mist dusted over the scenery, making everything look soft. Mi-Gyeong adjusted the volume on her phone, popped the earbuds back in, and flipped to the opening song of her favorite anime.  Then she took off at a run.

The forest along the path up to the school blurred past her.  Birds chittered and a few squirrels scurried away into trees, and she was pretty sure she’d seen a monkey swing up into the canopy.  No one had believed her the last time she’d said she’s seen a monkey on the island. Something about how they weren’t far north enough for snow monkeys to be native here.

As she nearly reached the part where the dirt path to Osiris would turn to the paved path up to the school, she veered to the left, diving into the trees.  She smacked through a couple of branches and bushes before she broke out into a thin trail, and kept running. She’d found this little deer trail in her first week, and decided that it was perfect for her running regimen.  The tunes of her music faded, and then swelled back up into the bouncy chords from one of her favorite shows ever: Power Rangers. Even though her heart was racing and her throat screaming from the long run already, it was enough to boost her to another sprint.

She was gasping for breath by the time she finally came out of the woods and into the clearing around the abandoned dorm, jogging down to a brisk walk.  She crossed behind the old crumbling dorm, craning her head to see if she could see inside any of the dark windows. She hadn’t been inside yet. For one, her teachers had told her not to.  For another, well...she was gonna wait until she was much stronger before she tackled the evil things. Her teachers could probably handle it until then!

Oh, speaking of her teachers...wasn’t that Yuki-sensei?

Mi-Gyeong slowed to a slower walk, squinting to be sure.  It was a tall person in a red jacket, so it could be one of her classmates, too.  As she drew closer, however, he looked up, and she was positive that it was Yuki-sensei.  She brightened. Wow!! She’d found him by himself! She hadn’t had much of a chance to talk to Yuki-sensei outside of classes, but she got the sense that he was really cool, already a superhero even!  If he’d be her mentor, she’d be set!

He frowned briefly as she jogged up, which wasn’t the best start, but she could work with ti!

“Good morning!” she called, pulling out one of her earbuds.

“Morning,” he said.  “What are you doing all the way out here?”

“Running,” she said, holding up her phone.  “The deer trail I use goes back through here.  Gotta stay in shape!”

He nodded then, cracking a smile.

“You’re not just running over here to get a look at the dorm?” he said, raising his eyebrows.

“Maybe a little,” she admitted.  “I’ve heard a lot about it! There’s so many rumors.  Oh!! Are you investigating something right now? Can I help?”

“Just checking for any leftover dark magic that we might accidentally set off when we finally tear this old place down,” he said, waving at it.  “And you can help by not snooping too much.”

Aww.  That was too bad.  But she saluted him anyway, hoping to make a good first impression.

“Roger!  I’ll keep out of your hair.”

He blinked, and then he chuckled.

“That was quick,” he said.  “You planning on sneaking in later?”

She shook her head quickly, smacking herself with her ponytail.

“Nuh-uh!!  When the protagonist doesn’t listen to good advice from their mentor, it usually makes everything go wrong real fast!  Don’t wanna mess up before I become a superhero!”

His smile split his face, and shook his head, putting his hands on his hips.

“Well, you’re way smarter than I was at your age,” he said.  “Keep it up.”

“Yes sir!” Mi-Gyeong said, saluting again.

Yuki-sensei’s smile faded, then, and he looked off towards the woods.  He suddenly seemed to get very quiet and distant. Mi-Gyeong blinked, waiting.  A breeze rustled past them, ruffling their hair.

Mi-Gyeong didn’t know all that much about Yuki-sensei.  Nina had told her some fun stories about last year, and Yuki-sensei had told the class some of the things he’d encountered and battled and done before, and he definitely seemed like a superhero already.  But she also got the sense that there was something sad about him. A tragic hero, maybe. It was a little bit exciting, but she also felt bad for thinking so.

“Yuki-sensei?” she asked, and he blinked, glancing at her.  “Is anything wrong?”

Yuki hesitated for a few moments, looking at her.  He bit his lip, and his eyes flickered up, as though he were thinking things over.  Or talking in his head, maybe — Nina had told her that Yuki-sensei was fused with a Duel Spirit in his head.

He finally came out of his silent conversation, and sighed.

“I hate to spread stuff like this and scare you guys,” he said, and Mi-Gyeong’s heart quickened.  She was about to get some kind of secret! “And I can’t expect you to keep it to yourself either. But...I feel like secrets have never been great around here.”

He rubbed one finger under his nose, looking distant again.  Mi-Gyeong leaned forward, excited.

“The truth is, I don’t know what’s coming,” he said.  “But there’s been a lot of magical activity around this dorm.  More than there has been since it was used as a laboratory to study Darkness.”

“Does that mean someone’s using it?” Mi-Gyeong asked.

“I don’t know.  It doesn’t seem like it’s being directed.  More like...it’s just being attracted.”

He shook his head.  Another breeze ruffled his coat tails and Mi-Gyeong’s ponytail.

“But I won’t lie to you.  It’s worrying me,” he said, looking Mi-Gyeong right in the eyes.  “So...Mi-Gyeong-chan?”

“Yes?”

“Maybe find another route to run on for now,” he said.

Mi-Gyeong felt a little bit of a chill pass over her.  Yuki-sensei looked pretty grim, and she shivered. Her eyes flickered back to the dorm.  It didn’t look evil. Just old and crumbling.

But she nodded.

“Okay,” she said.  “I will.”

* * *

“No. Way.  Really?? He said that??”

Nina’s mouth hung open, and Taro’s tail was wiggling like crazy — but it was a high wag, which meant he was pretty agitated.  He actually started panting nervously.

“Whoa,” said Toitoi, leaning back on her hands.  “I mean, I figured this school was pretty crazy what with all...this.  But like, evil spirits and shit? Now that’s a surprise.”

“Not really.  I’ve heard all sorts of weird stuff about that dorm,” Mylene said.

Mi-Gyeong nodded, leaning back on her hands.  They were all crunched into her dorm room. Harue had gone out to tend the flowers he’d planted outside the dorm, so it was just her Nina, Taro, Mylene and Toitoi.  Nina perched backwards on a chair, rocking back and forth on it. Taro and Toitoi sat cross legged on the floor next to each other, and Mylene was in the chair across from Mi-Gyeong, who sat crunched on the bottom bunk.

“Some evil stuff must be happening around in that dorm,” Mi-Gyeong said.

“I mean, yeah,” Nina said, scratching her head.  “To be honest, I haven’t been inside since last year, but I didn’t really notice anything weird.  I did find this wicked cool looking board game, but Yuki-sensei confiscated it from me before I could use it.  Told me it was cursed and he had no idea how I’d found it again.”

“What kind of board game?” asked Mylene.

“Dunno, the title was in English.  But it had some cool-ass space and rocket ship stuff on the front.”

Mi-Gyeong hummed, tilting her head back and forth.

“I wonder if it’s Armityle,” Taro said suddenly.  He looked sick, and he hugged his stomach, panting again with his ears pressed to his head.

Mi-Gyeong was surprised to see Nina go a little pale, too.

“Huh?  Who’s that?” Toitoi asked.

“Some wicked evil Duel Spirit demon thing,” Nina said.  “It’s like...a combo of the Three Phantasms.”

“Ooh, I’ve heard of those,” said Toitoi.  “There’s a thread on a conspiracy theory board I post on about it.  They’re like, evil versions of the Egyptian gods, right? There’s a rumor that they were responsible for this incident where all the art on all the cards disappeared for a few hours.”

“That was them,” Taro said.  He growled a bit in the back of his throat.

“Last year, me, Taro, Sacchan, Minato-kun, Micchan, and Saya-senpai fell through an interdimensional gate made by the Phantasms,” Nina said, suddenly looking excited again.  “We met that guy for a few minutes. It put us through some weird illusion test thing one at a time.”

Taro growled again, and Nina’s excited look sombered.  

“But, uh, yeah.  It was pretty scary,” she said.

“But what does that have to do with the abandoned dorm?” Mylene said.  “Were the Phantasms in there?”

Nina shook her head.

“They were underground,” she said.  “And then Yuki-sensei and Andersen-sensei moved ‘em.  Dunno where.”

“Maybe the abandoned dorm doesn’t have anything to do with Armityle, then,” Toitoi said. “Maybe it’s whatever happened there before."

“We should investigate!” Nina said, leaping up to her feet and almost knocking the chair over onto Toitoi.

“Yeah!” said Mylene, a grin splitting xir face.

“Nuh-uh,” Mi-Gyeong said.  “Yuki-sensei said no.”

Nina pouted at her, putting her hands on her hips.  Mylene made a puppy dog look at her.

“Hey!  What happened to your adventurous spirit?” said Nina.

Mi-Gyeong folded her arms.

“I’m an adventurer,” she said.  “But I don’t wanna disturb anything in there and make things worse for Yuki-sensei or Andersen-sensei.  I think if they want our help, they’ll definitely ask for it.”

“But we might solve it!” Nina said, flapping her hands up and down.  “Come on!”

“Nuh-uh,” said Mi-Gyeong.  “I can’t become the Red Power Ranger if I go bolting around sticking my nose into things and messing things up.”

“The Power Rangers aren’t real,” said Toitoi.

“We have magic powers!” Mi-Gyeong said, throwing her hands into the air.  “We can _make_ the Power Rangers real!”

“Besides, isn’t the point of the red Power Ranger that it’s always the hot-blooded leader who is impulsive and gets into trouble?” asked Mylene.  “I mean. I’ve only seen like...three episodes.”

“Yeah, and that’s how he gets all his friends kidnapped and almost loses, and has to learn how to not be stupid and impulsive,” Mi-Gyeong said.  “I’m just going to skip that whole lesson and be more efficient.”

Nina huffed, flopping back into her chair and resting her chin on the back.

“Taro, what about you?” she demanded, leaning forward on two legs of the chair.  “You wanna explore, don’t you?”

Taro ducked his head, looking away from Nina.

“Sorry, Nina,” he said.  “I think I’m with Mi-Gyeong-chan.”

Nina looked shocked, and almost a little hurt.  She leaned back onto all four legs of her chair, looking at nothing for a moment.  Mi-Gyeong quickly looked between them, and then glanced at Toitoi and Mylene for support.  She wasn’t sure exactly what was going on between her senpai here, but they both looked a little upset.  Toitoi frowned, and Mylene just shrugged xir shoulders.

“Whateverrr,” she said.  “Well, what do _you_ think we should do about it, Red Ranger?”

Mi-Gyeong blinked, her mouth parting.  Was that her nickname now? Red Ranger?  Was Nina teasing her, or was she actually taking Mi-Gyeong’s goals seriously.  It was hard to tell with Nina sometimes.

“Well, that’s why I called this meeting!” Mi-Gyeong said.  “Cause I think if something bad might be about to happen, we should prepare ourselves!  We should make our own like....team.”

Nina leaned forward on her chair again, looking suddenly interested.

“What do you mean?  Like...more training?  Or something?” Mylene asked.

“Yeah!” said Mi-Gyeong.  “We can practice together and like, come up with strategies for different scenarios.”

“That sounds like fun,” Taro said, his tail starting to wag.

“We’d be like...like the Power Rangers, I guess,” Toitoi said, laughing.  “Hey, there’s even five of us right now.”

“As long as I’m not the Pink Ranger,” Mylene said.

“Oh!! I call Pink then!” Nina said, throwing her hand up into the air.

“I’ll be Blue,” said Toitoi.  “Mylene, you can be Black, maybe.”

“Hella,” said Mylene, flashing a peace sign.

Nina was getting excited now, leaping to her feet.

“We could get other people involved too!” Nina said.  “Sacchan and Micchan would definitely join in! There’s like...other rangers, isn’t there?  Micchan would be the white one. There’s a white one, right?”

“Yeah, Tommy Oliver becomes the first white ranger in season 2 of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers,” Mi-Gyeong said, getting excited.  “I can be Red, then??”

“I mean, you’re the Rangers nerd here,” Mylene said, crossing xir eyes at Mi-Gyeong with a grin. “And you’re the one who started the group.”

“All right!” Mi-Gyeong squealed, throwing her hands into the air and smacking them against the bottom bunk.  She yelped and waved her hands out to shake the pain away.

“Oh, wait, that leaves Taro,” Nina said. “What color is left from the last five?”

“Yellow,” said Mi-Gyeong.  “I think you’d be a good Yellow Ranger, Taro-senpai!”

Taro flicked his ears, tilting his head.

“What?  You don’t like it?” Nina said.

“No, that’s not it,” said Taro.  “I just...what are the Power Rangers?”

Everyone stared at him for a few moments.  His ears flattened against his head in confusion.

And then Mi-Gyeong let out a little shriek.

“You don’t know about the _Power Rangers??_ ” she shrieked.  “Oh my god!! Put the team on hold for a minute!!  We gotta fix this!!”

She leaped from the bed and reached over Nina to grab her laptop, fumbling to open it up.

“Buckle up, bitches!!  It’s morphin time!!” she said.


	12. The Spirit World - Time for Field Trip!!

“I can’t believe we get to go to the spirit world again!! It’s not even time for the field trip yet!”

Nina bounced up and down in her seat and Minato tried to push her to sit down.  She was shaking the whole seat and it was annoying them. 

“And we get to take an interdimensional bus ride this time,” Taro said, leaning over the back of the seat behind them.  Nina reached back to give him a high five. “I’ve never been on one of these!!”

The bus was pretty interesting, actually.  From the outside, it looked like a regular bus — albeit one that was a weird, dark red-purple in color.  But inside, it was way bigger, with just enough seats to accommodate all three Osiris classes. All the seats and interior were black, and from inside, you couldn’t see outside the windows.  Once they were all seated, the little imp-like bus driver started up the bus, but Minato didn’t feel it moving at all.

“Is this normal travel between dimensions?” Saki asked from the seat in front of Minato.  “Last year you just brought us across.”

“Well, it’s the safest way,” Yuki-sensei answered.  He was standing at the front of the bus, beside a very tiny little woman in a dark blue stewardess outfit.  Minato tried not to feel uncomfortable with the fact that that was  _ definitely _ Tour Guide to the Underworld.  “The last few times I’ve brought students over with me, but the dimensions have gotten a little wobbly here and there since last year.  It’s easier to keep you all in one place on the bus.”

“And we won’t have anyone falling out in between transfers to the wrong dimension,” Andersen-sensei said from the front seat, with just the barest hint of a grin.

Yuki flushed.

“That was once,” he hissed.

“Oh my god, really??  Who was it? Where did they go?” Nina said.

Yuki looked like he was going to tell Nina to leave the questions for later, but Andersen turned to look over the back of his seat and grinned.

“It was Saito-san, and she ended up getting very chummy with the Ghostricks,” he said.

Nina let out an excited squeal, and Reina made a hoarse chuckling sound.

“Anyway,” Yuki said, still blushing.  “It’s very important that you all stick to the schedules on your pagers, and stay with your assigned groups.”

“Our biggest goal this year is to foster better relations with our ally dimensions, and to help you all have real connections here, so we’re going to be having a few more excursions than previous years,” Andersen said.  “And try to remember to be respectful.”

Minato’s lips pressed together as Nina and Taro began to jabber with excitement.  More excursions to the spirit world to foster connections? They wondered if this had anything to do with Hinata and last year.  It certainly would be better for the whole class if they got stuck in another dimension like Hinata and they had a sense of how to navigate, and maybe Duel Spirits they could contact.  They guessed from the faint flicker in Yuki-sensei’s eyes that there might be a more urgent reason for it, too.

“Sensei, where are we going today?” asked one of the first years.  Minato was pretty sure that was Harue? They had trouble remembering everyone’s names.  “I’ve heard from the other students that you visited Skyscraper the last few years.”

“Are we going back?” Nina asked with a shriek of excitement.  Minato had to plug their ears. Yeesh.

“We’ll be going to Skyscraper at the same time we did last year,” Yuki-sensei said.  “But this year, we happen to have a transfer student from the spirit world, and Diana-san was kind enough to help us organize this trip.” 

He nodded to one of the first-years in a seat near the front.  Minato could only see the back of her head, her pale blond hair shifting as she nodded back.

“We’re headed to one of the highest levels of the spirit world, the one directly below our world,” Andersen-sensei said.  “Who remembers which one that is?”

A hand shot up from the back, and Andersen nodded at her.  Mi-Gyeong shot up to her feet.

“That’s Fairy’s Peak, right?” she said.

“Right,” Andersen-sensei said with a smile.  “Specifically, we’re headed to a place known as the Chorus of Sanctuary.”

Another hand shot up, and Yuki-sensei nodded at them.  Lin didn’t stand up because of their crutches, but they answered from their seat.

“That’s a field spell in our version of the game, right?” they asked.  “It increases monster defense.”

“Very good,” Andersen said.  “It’s a very safe place. Combat is actually illegal there, so it’s a good first visit for some of you who have never been to the spirit world.”

There was a faint bumping sound, and the imp bus driver made a small chittering sound.  The Tour Guide to the Underworld piped up then with a cute, high-pitched voice.

“We’re here!” she said.  “Thank you for riding with us!  We’ll be back to pick you all up in six hours.”

Minato stood, and for a few moments there was just a shuffling of feet and fumbling of bodies as everyone tried to file off the bus, and people bumped into each other and chattered. The minute they were in view of the door, however, Minato sucked in a deep breath.  The thick scent of flowers came along with the burst of clear, fresh air. As they stepped off the bus after Nina, they couldn’t help but stare with awe.

An endless field of flowers stretched out before them.  There was nothing to mar the horizon. Huge, heavy roses bobbed in a cool, pleasant breeze, and Minato could hear song coming from somewhere, a mix of bird cries and voices.  The air was so clear that Minato almost felt dizzy — there must not be even a lick of pollution out here.

Yuki and Andersen ferried the class around the bus, and Minato noted where the music must be coming from.  They were near the top of a small hill, and before them was a large gate. Poking out from behind the gate was the tip of a roof, which was surprisingly Japanese in structure.  Beyond the temple at the top of the hill, Minato could see a valley spreading out beneath it, with little huts and houses dotting the landscape. A few columns of smoke rose up from a few of them, and there were small movements that might have been people, or rather, Duel Spirits.

“Okay, we’re going to be assigning you all to groups,” Andersen called.  “Listen for your name! And check your pagers for your itinerary.”

Minato listened for their name.

“Group seven will be Togo Reina, Fujita Minato, and Diana Velis.”

Minato looked around for Reina, and saw her holding her hand up like a statue so that the others could see her.  Minato made their way over, and arrived just as the blond girl from before appeared.

“Oh, hey,” Minato said.  “Diana-san, right?”

She smiled and nodded.

“And you’re...Minato-kun?”

“Just Minato is fine.  This is Reina.”

“This is Reina,” Reina repeated.

Diana smiled and bowed.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you!  I look forward to sharing my home with you.”

Oh, that was right, Minato thought.  Diana was the exchange student who’d helped set this up.

“So...you’re from here?” Minato asked, wondering if it was impolite to ask if she was a Duel Spirit.

Diana brightened.

“Yes!  This is my temple. I was raised here with the other Elemental Mistresses.”

“Well, I’m definitely looking forward to getting the insiders’ view of this place,” Minato said.  “I guess our group is the lucky one.”

“Looking forward to,” Reina said with a big smile.

Diana brightened even further, looking almost shiny with excitement.  They waited patiently for the last groups to be assigned, and then Andersen-sensei put his clipboard away.

“All right, now remember everyone, please be respectful. Don’t touch things without permission. And try to stay on time!”

“This way,” Diana said immediately, beckoning to Minato and Reina.  “We’re going to visit the temple first!”

A couple other groups were headed to the temple as well, and Minato and Reina followed along.  Diana looked fit to burst with excitement.

“Have you been away from your home for long before?” Minato asked her.

“This is the first time I’ve been away at all,” Diana said. “I’m really excited to say hello to everyone!”

“First time?  Have?” Reina asked.  She frowned, as though trying to come up with other words to ask what she wanted to ask.  Minato tried to guess.

“I think Reina-senpai wants to know why you came to Duel Academia?” they asked.

Reina smiled with relief, nodding to indicate that that had been her question.

“Oh!  Well, you see,” Diana said.  “The Elemental Mistresses are trained to be traveling clerics.  We must learn as much as we can about all of the realms and to emulate all essences so that we can better serve.”

“So this is like an internship for you?” Minato said.

“I suppose so!” Diana said with a smile.  “We all have to take a placement at least three times during our training.  I’m the first ever to take a placement among the Physical Realm!”

She looked very excited by this, and Minato had to smile.  They were looking forward to learning about this place. Diana led them through the gates and up towards the temple.  It definitely looked Japanese in style, though up close, it was clear that there were other architectural elements as well.  While the building was Japanese in shape and the roof was curved, there were marble pillars along the edges supporting the roof that looked Greek, some Gothic flying buttresses along the sides, and some bubble-shaped domes that rose to a teardrop shape sat atop the roof like something from India.

Diana took off her shoes before the steps up onto the platform around the temple, and Reina and Minato copied her.  They stepped up onto the paneled deck, and then to the big green doors. Diana pushed them open. 

Inside it looked far less Japanese, but it didn’t look much like anything from Earth that Minato had ever seen, either.  A thick cover of hanging plants covered the high ceiling, tangled vines letting down tendrils heavy with white flowers dangling down below, and wind chimes hanging among them.  The floor appeared to be made of glass, but when Minato stepped on it, the image of ripples moved beneath their feet, despite feeling no water. It was like a strange projection of water that felt like frozen glass.  Several huge braziers flickering with blue fire lined a few winding pathways that were indicated with different shaped stones laid together in lines.

At the very far end was a raised dais with a few wooden steps raised up to it.  A small box-like shrine, surrounded by lush greenery, sat at the top. There was a small shelf in front of the grilled window into the box, and two candles stood on either side of the window.  One was lit, but the other was not.

This looked, at first, to be the entirety of the temple, but as Minato looked around, they saw a few doors set into the walls, almost hidden by the greenery, but indicated by the pathways that led to them.

“This is the main shrine of the Elemental Mistresses,” Diana explained. “This is where we go to pay respects to the gods and the forces that create and maintain our world.”

She pointed to each element as she spoke.

“First, water, which is represented by the frozen lake on the floor,” she said.  “Then, earth, represented by the plant life. Fire is the braziers, of course, and wind is the chimes.  Light and darkness are represented by the lit and unlit candle, and within the shrine is the essence of divine.”

“It’s incredible,” Minato said, staring around.  “Who takes care of all the plants?”

“The youngest acolytes tend the elements here,” Diana said.  “We keep the plants tended and the fires lit.”

She led them down one of the winding paths, pointing out small pedestals with images of gods on them.

“There’s a lot of gods,” Minato said.

“A lot,” Reina agreed.

“The divine are many and varied, and not all of them are truly gods in the sense that humans believe,” Diana said.  “But we pay respects to them all the same, for either their great deeds or their continued defense of our world.”

“Is this considered a place of worship?” Minato said, frowning. “I’ve never been very religious.”

Diana laughed, a light sound that was echoed by the chimes that moved overhead when the doors opened to let in a breeze.

“I’ve found during my time among you that you humans have a very different idea of religion than we do,” she said, smiling. “We do not worship the divine.  We merely pay it due respect for its part. Our way is an equal harmony along with the divine, which is neither better nor lesser than us, but simply different.”

Minato had to smile at that.  They were starting to like this place a heck of a lot more than any temples or churches back home.

Their path reached the main shrine, and Diana clasped her hands together and made a small bow.  Minato and Reina copied her.

Minato heard one of the doors open, then, one near the left side of the building.  A sweet looking woman with dark skin and bright blue hair curled beneath a white veil appeared. Diana let out a squeak of delight when she saw her, and ran down the path until she reached the door, throwing herself into a hug.  The woman laughed and hugged back.

“Little Diana!  You’re here much earlier than I thought,” the woman said.

Minato and Reina followed over, and Minato hung back, feeling suddenly awkward.  The woman looked up, and beamed at the two of them.

“These must be your classmates!” she said.  “I was supposed to be leading tours in here.  I suppose you didn’t need one.”

“You probably would have done a better job,” Diana said, blushing.  “Minato, Reina-senpai. This is Sister Artemis! She’s my mentor!”

“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” Minato said, bowing.

“Pleasure to meet you,” said Reina, also bowing.

Artemis waved a hand with a laugh.

“There’s no need to be so formal,” she said.  “We’re very happy to have you here! Making a new connection with a new realm is a pretty big deal for us.”

“Well, we’re really excited to have been able to come,” Minato said.  “The temple is very pretty.”

“Incredible,” Reina said, echoing something Minato had said earlier.

Artemis beamed.

“That’s wonderful to hear!” she said.  The doors opened again, and Minato saw another handful of students walk in, though they were too far away to recognize who they were off the bat.  “Now, I believe I need to keep running tours in here, Diana. But stop by before you leave! I want to hear about your placement!”

“I will!  It’s so good to see you!”

Diana looked a little disappointed as Artemis walked away to meet the other students.  But she perked back up.

“Well!” she said, clapping her hands.  “We actually got through the temple pretty fast.  Let me show you the rest of the building!”

They poked around the building for another thirty minutes or so.  Diana showed them the little rooms where the Elemental Mistresses and their acolytes lived, which were not quite as barren as Minato had imagined a convent to be.  In fact, they all looked as lovely and colorful and full of plants as the temple had. The beds were even grown out of big, plushy looking flowers. They saw the mess hall, which was more earthen, with the tables and chairs carved from marble that seemed to have sprouted from the ground itself.  She showed them the courtyard, then, where Mistresses practiced their magic. There were more clerics and acolytes there, and they fell a bit behind schedule while Diana excitedly greeted her friends and mentors, introduced them to Minato and Reina, and caught up with them on what she’d missed since she’d been away.

“Sorry!!” she said, as she finally pulled away and waved goodbye.  “I’ve held you up!”

“No worries, this is actually way more interesting than I feel like it would have been usually,” Minato said.  “And I’m glad you have a chance to say hi.”

Diana blushed, still looking excited from her chattering.  

“There’s one more place for us to see before we can go out into the town, and it won’t take long,” she said.  “Follow me!”

She took them down a thin staircase.  It got darker and darker the farther they went, and Minato was starting to get claustrophobic before a light finally flickered before them.

They came out into a significantly smaller space than the temple, but still pretty wide nonetheless.  It was dark down here, and there weren’t any plants. Only a few cold white lights hung in spheres from the ceiling, illuminating the eerie space.  Minato couldn’t help but shiver. This looked a lot like a graveyard.

Large stone blocks stood up right on the floor, like headstones, but there was nothing written on them.  He could see the faint imprint of images carved onto them, but they were hard to parse. Some of them might have been monstrous creatures, others looked more human.

“What’s here?” Reina whispered.

“This is the shrine to the fallen,” Diana said in a low voice.

“It’s...a graveyard?”

“I suppose that’s the closest analogy,” Diana said.  “But you know that us Duel Spirits do not die as humans do.  We can be killed, but unless we willingly pass on to the Unknown, we will live forever.  And we leave behind no bodies, so there is no reason for us to build graves”

“So who is this for?” Minato asked.

Diana looked very somber.

“This is for the divine who turned against the world,” she said.  “Look there.”

She pointed to the largest stone, near the back.  In the dull light, Minato could make out the shape of a large, hulking creature with twisted horns and a monstrous looking dragon head that might have been coming out of its tail.

“That one is Apep,” Diana said.  “It was the god of destruction, and it chose to go beyond its duties to attempt to end the world.”

Minato thought they remembered that name.  Hadn’t Taro told them a story about Apep once before?  The one who had created Armityle?

“Is Armityle here too?” they asked.

Diana blinked.  She nodded, looking surprised that Minato would ask that question.  Minato felt their stomach twist.

“Why?” Reina asked.

“Because, for better or worse,” Diana said.  “They were a part of this universe’s turning.”

“They tried to ruin it,” Minato said.  “Seems like a weird thing to put into a divine plan.”

Diana smiled.

“There’s another place where we differ from humanity, Minato,” she said.  “We do not believe in any divine plan. Each divine has its own plan, but to imagine that they know everything and how it will occur?  Not everything happens for a reason. Sometimes there is cruelty and it does not tie in to some greater narrative.”

She pressed her hands together and bowed her head respectfully towards the stones.  Minato wasn’t sure they could bring themself to do so.

“And yet, we will respect them, because in the end, they were a part of forming the lives we have now.  They may have done evil things, but from the wildfire sprouts the forest.”

Minato frowned.  They weren’t sure how to feel about this part of the philosophy.

Diana took them back up the stairs, and Minato was glad to be far away from the place.  They did not want to think about Armityle, or anything related to that monster. Much less pay it any respect.

They all remained rather quiet as Diana led them out of the temple back outside.

“Well,” she said finally.  “I suppose now we can head down to the town —”

She stopped, hesitating.  Minato heard a nearby faint sob, and followed Diana’s gaze.  Their eyes widened when they saw Saki, sitting at the bottom of the steps.  Ji-U was sitting with her, awkwardly rubbing her back but looking out of place.  Saki had crunched up over her legs, and her shoulders were shaking. 

Minato leaped down the stairs two at a time and skidded to a stop near Saki.

“What’s wrong?  What happened?”

Saki sniffled, sitting up immediately.

“I’m fine,” she gasped, but it was clear that she wasn’t.  “I’m fine!”

Ji-U’s face went very white, and she looked like she was about to blow up.

“She and Haruka-san had a fight,” Ji-U said through grit teeth.  “Don’t ask me about what.”

It was clear that Ji-U knew exactly about what, but she looked too angry for Minato to attempt to ask her.  They turned their attention to Saki.

“What on earth did she say to you?” Minato asked Saki.

Saki shook her head, rubbing her tears away.

“It’s fine.  I’m fine. It was stupid and I’m too sensitive.  Time of the month,” she said. “Don’t let me hold you up.”

“Where is Matsushita-san now?” Diana asked, looking concerned.

“Who cares?” Ji-U said bluntly.  “It’s safe here, and she’s a bitch.  She’ll be fine.”

Diana looked concerned though, wringing her hands. 

“I’ll go tell Artemis and the teachers to look for her,” she said.

“Don’t bother,” Ji-U said, even though Diana was already running off.

Saki’s shoulders kept shaking, and Minato just stood there, feeling wholly useless.  What on earth was wrong with that Haruka girl, anyway?


	13. Get the Eggwich! - Toitoi's Super Luck!!

“Is this really that important?” Anani said, blinking.

“Of course it is!!” Nina said.  “This is a training of our luck and intuition!  That’s really important for our team!”

They crowded around the sandwich lottery box, crouched or leaning over it in a cluster.  Nina was on the balls of her feet, staring at the lineup of sandwiches today. All of them were wrapped with the exact same packaging, the exact same size, and the smells are all tangled together so that it was impossible to tell which one.  Toitoi leaned over her just above her, and Mi-Gyeong was pressed against her side. Anani, who’d been dragged into today’s adventure, hugged her knees and pressed against Nina’s other size, squished in by Morgan and Mylene on the side and behind her.  Taro hung back, pouting. He’d been asked to sit this one out, since the last four times he’d gotten the golden eggwich every single time — his better nose could pick out the smells even though they were all mixed together. And that was cheating, anyway — this was a test of luck and intuition!  You couldn’t use your nose to figure out what card you were going to draw, or which set card was the best to destroy.

“Everyone got your eye on a sandwich?” Nina called.

“Yup!” said Mylene.

“Got it,” said Toitoi.

“I guess,” said Anani with a sigh.

“On three!  One, two, three!”

They all reached for their sandwich at the same time, and by some miracle, none of them reached for the same one.  Nina grabbed hers and ripped it open eagerly.

“Oh no,” she groaned.  “Tuna! I hate tuna!”

“I’ll trade you,” Morgan said, wrinkling her nose.  “I’ve gotten the vegetarian one.”

“Oh, yay,” said Anani, and everyone looked at her.  She turned red all the way to her fingers. “It’s not the eggwich.  It’s just a peanut butter and jelly. That’s my favorite.”

“Boring,” Nina groaned.  “Mylene?”

“No go,” xe said, showing xir sandwich.  “Plain old turkey salad.”

“Can I get one now?  I’m hungry,” Taro said.

“Yo,” Toitoi said suddenly.  “Yo, guys! I got it!”

Everyone leaped to their feet, save Anani, who almost fell over now that no one was pressed against her to keep her up.  They all crowded around Toitoi, who hugged the sandwich close to her to avoid it getting crushed. Sure enough, there it was — the golden eggwich, glittering in the shop’s lights.

“No fair!!” Nina said.  “That’s so awesome!! I can’t believe you grabbed it out of all those sandwiches!”

“I just hope it tastes good,” Toitoi said.  She took a bite, and her eyes lidded with delight. “Oh, damn, yeah, it does.   _ Hinna, hinna _ .”

“What does that mean, by the way?” Taro asked through a mouthful of sandwich.  He’d grabbed his own while everyone was crowding Toitoi. “I hear you say it a lot.”

“Oh, it’s kinda like  _ itadakimasu, _ ” Toitoi said.  “It’s a gratitude for the food.”

“What language is that?” Nina asked.

“It’s Ainu,” Toitoi said. “Didn’t I tell you guys I was Ainu?”

“Oh!” Taro said.  “I remember that now.”

“Ainu?” said Nina, blinking.

Toitoi glanced around at them, seeing a lot of blank looks.  She made a soft ‘oh’ sound as she looked from one to the other.

“Oh, right,” she said.  “You’re all foreigners except Taro.”

Nina hadn’t even noticed, but it was true.  She was from Italy, Morgan was English, Anani was Russian, Mylene was French, and Mi-Gyeong was from South Korea.  Toitoi took another big bite of her sandwich and swallowed it before talking.

“Ainu are the original people of Japan,” she said.  “We were here before the sisam from the mainland came over.”

“Oh, like the Native Americans in the US?” Nina said.

“I guess that’s pretty close,” Toitoi said. “My name, Toitoi, that’s my Ainu nickname.  The one on my pager is my Japanese name.”

“It’s a nickname?  What’s your real name?” Mi-Gyeong said.

Toitoi grinned and chewed another bite of the eggwich.

“Secret,” she said, winking.  “Damn. That was a great sandwich.”

“Lucky duck,” Nina said, glowering.   She wordlessly switched sandwiches with Morgan when Morgan held hers out.  “How are you so lucky?”

“I’m not that lucky.”

“No, you are!  Haven’t you guys noticed?  Toitoi is super lucky!”

“She’s beaten me in all our practice matches because she draws the only card that can get her out of that situation,” Mi-Gyeong said.

“Once I saw her texting and walking and somehow she moved around the rock in her path without looking,” said Anani.

“I’m just really good at spatial awareness,” said Toitoi.

“Once when she snuck out, she got back literally seconds before Yuki-sensei came to check on us,” Mylene said, tapping xir lips.  “Also, I’m pretty sure I’ve only seen you studying exactly what you need to study the day before we have a pop quiz.”

Everyone looked at her.  Toitoi blinked back at them.  Then she blushed, rubbing the back of her neck.

“I’m not  _ that _ lucky,” she said.

Nina grabbed her hands.

“Toitoi-sensei,” she said.  “Teach us your lucky ways!”

“Huh?? How can you teach luck??”

“Maybe some of it will rub off,” Mi-Gyeong said, hugging Toitoi around the shoulders and almost toppling her over.

“Darlings, luck is overrated,” Morgan said, finishing her sandwich off with her usual poise.  “You’ll get better results by simply working hard.”

“Yeah, but remember how Taro and me fell through a dimensional hole last year?? That was pretty bad luck!!” Nina said.  “You can’t work hard to avoid that! So we’ve gotta get luckier if we’re gonna face the bad guys!”

She whirled on Toitoi again, who was still struggling with Mi-Gyeong hugging her, half laughing and half looking very put upon.

“Toitoi-sensei!  Let’s have a luck class!”

“Luck class?  I don’t think that’s something you can learn.”

They all jumped a little at the sound of the door opening.  Yuki-sensei had just come through, half smiling at their group.

“Yuki-sensei!  Toitoi got the golden eggwich!” Nina said, shaking Toitoi’s arm up and down.

“Whoa, nice job,” Yuki said with a grin.  “That’s a feat.”

“I got it four times in a row,” Taro grumbled.

“Doesn’t count!  You cheated with your dog nose!” Nina said.

Yuki laughed. 

“Sounds more like using your skills to your advantage,” he said, and Taro perked up, his tail wagging and his ears pricking upwards.  “But what’s that I heard about a luck class?”

“Toitoi is unfairly lucky,” Mylene said.  “We want her to teach us how to do it.”

“I’m telling you, it’s not something I do consciously,” Toitoi said.  “It just happens.”

“I’m sure we can figure out what you do differently that makes you lucky!” Nina said.

Yuki-sensei chuckled again, passing them to get to the sandwiches.  He glanced over them quickly and then selected one, sticking his meal card into the slot before unwrapping it.

“You know, I knew a kid when I was in school who got obsessed with stuff like that,” he said, unwrapping his sandwich.  “He disappeared into the woods around the school for six months to train his draw sense. Came back and started stealing the golden eggwich every day for a few weeks.”

“You mean he actually did it? He trained his luck?” Anani said with surprise.

“Honest to god, I have no idea,” Yuki said, shaking his head.  “For all I know, he might have ended up having some kind of powers that we would have been able to identify now, something that his time in the woods helped him awaken.  But I dunno. Lost touch with him after graduation.”

He took a small bite of his sandwich and wrinkled his nose.

“Sloppy joe,” he sighed, wrapping it back up.  “No luck for me today, I guess.”

He sent them a small smile and a two fingered salute.

“Don’t get too wrapped up in it, though,” he said.  “Luck is only a small part of life. What you really need is to learn how to roll with what that luck deals out to you.”

He smiled again, and passed back out of the shop.  Nina hummed, rubbing her chin.

“You look like you have ideas,” Taro said, tail wagging.  “What are we going to do?”

“Let’s go into the woods!” Nina said.  “We’ll have a training session out there and see if it makes us luckier!”

“Heck yeah!!” Mi-Gyeong said, punching the air.

“I think that’s my time to excuse myself,” Morgan said.  “Ta-ta, darlings.”

She flounced out of the shop, and everyone glanced at Anani.  She turned red again, but then it faded to a faint pale yellow.

“I think I’ll come along,” she said.  “If that’s all right.”

“The more the merrier,” said Mylene.  “All right, rangers, let’s roll out.”

Taro’s eyes lit up, and he started humming the Power Rangers theme song under his breath.  Mi-Gyeong joined in with a rousing, offkey chorus in English. Nina couldn’t help but giggle.  Taro was totally obsessed with the Rangers with Mi-Gyeong now. They were such nerds.

* * *

The woods were warm and bright, sunlight filtering through the trees.  The branches rustled from running squirrels and fluttering birds, and the faint hum of insects and birdsong filled the air.

“So, what’s this training regimen even going to be?” Mylene asked, stretching.

Everyone looked at Mi-Gyeong.

“What??” she said.

“You’re the one who’s the exercise nut,” said Mylene.  “Plus, aren’t you the red ranger?”

That perked Mi-Gyeong up.

“Well, to train luck, we’ll have to do things that need more luck!” she said.  “How about...uh...a scavenger hunt!”

“Ooh, I like it!!” said Nina.  “What will we look for?”

They crowded in a circle for a bit, arguing about what they could find in the forest, and what was too much trouble or definitely not going to be there.  Then they argued about doing it solo or in pairs. Finally, they decided on pairs, and drew straws. Mylene would go with Anani, Taro would go with Mi-Gyeong, and Nina would go with Toitoi.

“Heck yeah!  I get Miss Lucky!” Nina said, throwing an arm over Toitoi’s shoulders.

“Hey, don’t count your chickens,” Toitoi said.  “I’m gonna disappoint y’all now that you’ve decided I’m lucky.”

“We’ll meet back here in three hours,” Anani said, marking the spot with a branch she stuck into the ground. “Whoever is back first with all the items, or at least a picture of them, wins!”

“Let’s go!” Nina said, charging ahead.

Toitoi had to run to keep up, and for a few minutes, they just ran straight into the woods.  Nina only stopped when she heard Toitoi gasp out her name.

“What?” Nina asked.

“Up there,” Toitoi said, pointing.  “I see a bird’s nest.”

“That’s number four on the list!!  Let’s get a picture! We’re lucky already!”

“Or I just happened to look up,” Toitoi teased.

Nina ignored her, scrambling up the trunk so she could get a picture with her phone.  She swore as she almost lost her balance, and then her eyes widened when her hand smacked the nest.  There were eggs inside! Oh no!

Toitoi leaped forward, and the nest fell right into her hands.  They stood there for a brief, panicked second.

“Lucky catch,” Nina said.

“Ugh,” Toitoi said, rolling her eyes.

She helped Nina put the nest back in the tree and they took a picture.  They walked more leisurely through the woods now, searching the nooks and crannies for mushrooms or bird feathers or shiny rocks that would fit the list requirements.  Toitoi found most of their items, though Nina was the one who caught a blurry photo of one of the legendary Duel Academia monkeys, who were rumored to be able to duel like people.

“I’m jealous!  I wanted to see one of them,” Toitoi said, looking at Nina’s photo.  “See, Nina, you’re lucky, too!”

“So rarely, though,” Nina said with a grown.  “But that’s the last of the stuff, and we still have an hour!  Let’s head back!”

She stopped, then, as she suddenly realized she had no idea where they were.  She looked at Toitoi, who gave her a blank look.

“Um,” Nina said.  “Do you remember which way is back?”

Toitoi frowned, looking around.  Then she looked a little pale too.

“No,” she said.  “I think we came from that way, but we made so many turns to grab stuff.”

They both turned in circles, trying to notice some way of figuring out which way they should go.  Nina suggested climbing a tree, but none of them nearby had branches low enough for them to reach.  The forest seemed to stretch on forever, and the sound of animals rustling in the bushes seemed suddenly ominous.

“Well, let’s pick a direction and start walking,” Toitoi said.  “I’m sure we’ll have to leave the forest eventually, and it’s an island.  If we hit the beach, we can follow it around until we see something recognizable.”

“That’s good enough I guess,” said Nina.  “Plus, you’re lucky; maybe you’ll pick the right direction!”

Toitoi rolled her eyes, but she started walking, and Nina followed.  They walked in silence for a long time, listening to birds, picking their way over rocks.

“Hey, Nina?” Toitoi asked.

“Yeah?”

“Did you...really go to another world?  Last year?”

Nina loved talking about her adventures.  But for whatever reason, remembering Dark World, and the illusion of the evil Yuki-sensei, was a little discomforting, even in hindsight.  She frowned, wondering why it bothered her so much.

“Yeah,” she said.  “But so did you! You went to Fairy’s Peak with us already, so it’s not that cool.”

She glanced at Toitoi, and found her looking a little...sad?  Uncomfortable? Nervous? Toitoi couldn’t quite tell.

“Why?” she said.  “What’s up?”

“I dunno,” Toitoi said.  “I guess...”

She rubbed the back of her neck.

“I said I was Ainu,” she said.  “And well...I guess it doesn’t really mean much anymore.  Being Ainu.”

“What does that mean?” Nina said, wondering how these two things were connected.

“It’s hard to explain, I guess.  You’re not Japanese. But like...the Ainu used to be their own culture, right?  And there was a lot of them. But then the  _ sisam _ kinda took over, and...man, I barely even know my own language, Nina.”

Toitoi looked really upset, now, and Nina stopped walking.  Toitoi stopped, too, as though she’d been looking for an excuse.

“I mean, I’d always known I had powers.  But I always thought, I dunno. Maybe they came from being Ainu.  I wanted to know so much more about being Ainu even before I started playing shadow games, but my grandma died when I was a baby and my mom doesn’t really care, and there’s no one to talk to about it.”

It was all coming out in a rush, now, and it was all Nina could do to keep up.  Clearly, Toitoi had been dealing with this for a long time.

“I tried to learn everything I could, I found books and read online, but there’s like, nothing left, and I can’t find anyone to talk to and my mom doesn’t even seem to want me to.  But I learned whatever I could, and I felt really close to it all. I learned about our gods, our kamuy, and some of our traditions, and stuff, and...”

Toitoi was starting to cry a little now, and Nina felt a bit panicky. She was so bad with crying!! She didn’t know what to do when people cried! She awkward patted Toitoi’s shoulder while Toitoi rubbed at her eyes.

“And then I come here, and I find out my powers don’t have anything to do with being Ainu, and I don’t know.  We went to another world with spirits and gods and that temple and it just...made me feel like maybe it’s not real.  All the Ainu stuff I knew about our kamuy, maybe it’s fake, or a mix up of something some ancient Ainu saw in the spirit world.  Maybe that closeness wasn’t even real.”

Nina kept patting her, and Toitoi covered her face in her hands, crying silently.  Nina looked around, as though someone might melt out of the trees to help Toitoi in the way that Nina couldn’t.  But it was just her, and just Toitoi.

“Um,” Nina asked.  “So you asked me about the other world cause...maybe you were wondering if your uh...kamuy were there instead?”

Toitoi nodded, face still covered.  Nina hesitated. This is something that Yuki-sensei or Andersen-sensei should be helping with, she thought desperately.  She had no idea what to say.

“Uh,” Nina said.  “I’m really sorry.  I don’t know what to say.”

“It’s okay,” Toitoi mumbled.  “It was stupid to dump on you.”

“No, no, it’s okay,” Nina said hurriedly.  “Um. I think...I think you shouldn’t give up on that stuff yet.”

Toitoi sucked in a breath. She peeked between her fingers.  Nina fumbled. She wasn’t sure where to go from there.

“I mean, sure, there’s a whole other world of spirits and stuff out there, and maybe they’re not what you expected but uh...that doesn’t mean what you believe isn’t real  _ somewhere _ .  Maybe in a world even bigger than this one!”

She waved her arms up and down.

“I mean, think about it!  The other day, you probably didn’t even know how big the world is.  There’s probably other worlds we haven’t even found yet! I’ll bet that all the stuff you learned about, it’s definitely real!  We just haven’t figured out how to see it yet.”

Toitoi sniffled.  She wiped her tears away. Then she smiled tentatively.

“Thank you, Nina,” she said.  “I feel a little better.”

Nina blew out in a rush, slumping relief.

“Oh, good!  Because I’m really bad at this!”

Toitoi snickered, but hiccuped over a lump of fresh tears.

“Anyway,” Toitoi said.  “Let’s find our way back.”

They made their way back, and Nina was somehow not surprised to find that Toitoi had led them straight to the branch that Anani had set up, and well before the others showed up.

“Maybe you’re not lucky,” Nina said suddenly, and Toitoi looked at her with surprise.  “Maybe your kamuy is looking out for you.”

Toitoi blinked.  And then a huge smile burst out over her face.

“ _ Hiouoi _ , Nina,” she whispered.  “Thank you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> to the best of my knowledge, all the little nuggets of information about the Ainu and the language used by Toitoi in this story are historically accurate. I did the best research I could, but I can't necessarily confirm the legitimacy of all of my sources, or really even if "Toitoi" is an actual Ainu name; and for full disclosure, a large amount of my information comes from the anime Golden Kamuy, though I definitely did extra research as well. Unfortunately, there's not a lot of English language information available, and I apologize for any discrepancies or mistakes I might have made in writing Toitoi or representing the Ainu.


	14. Saito's Leftover Game! - The Seventh Wonder of Duel Academy

“All right everyone!  We’ve all been doing great with all the training stuff so far,” Nina said.  “But let’s take it up a notch!”

Miu yawned, and Saki looked like she was getting ready to fall asleep.  Taro poked her on the shoulder, grinning as she startled awake.

“Nina, it’s like...six in the morning on a Sunday,” Minato grumbled.  “Can’t we sleep?”

“No time to sleep!  The bad stuff won’t always wait for us to be well rested!!”

Minato groaned and let their head fall to the table.  Taro snickered — he himself was wide awake. He had absolutely no problems with insomnia, and he took plenty of naps all day.

They’d taken over the mess hall for their meeting, as it was hard to fit all of them into any of the rooms, even one of the bigger upperclassmen rooms.  Nina and Mi-Gyeong were standing on top of one of the tables, and Mylene was sitting behind them. Taro sat on the other side from xir, and Saki, Miu, and Minato had taken up the table next to it.  Toitoi was perched on the edge of their table, fiddling with her phone.

The only other people outside of their default group that had decided to join them for “training just in case something bad happens again like last year” were the twins, Akiara, and Takako, who’d taken over a third table.  Eun was busy seeing how many pigtails she could fit into Akiara’s very short hair, and Akiara looked like she was half asleep. Ji-U was texting, and Takako had brought a book, so it wasn’t even positive if they were actually here for the training or not.

“Okay, I’ll bite,” Mylene said.  “What’s our mission today, rangers?”

“Today,” Nina said.  “We’re going to confirm and face the seven wonders of Duel Academy!”

“Didn’t we already disprove most of those last year from a single conversation?” Saki said.

“Ooh!  Tell me the seven wonders, I haven’t heard this!” Toitoi said, leanng forward.

“The first wonder is the abandoned dorm, where it’s said you can hear the voices of the students who disappeared there,” Nina said.

“We’re not going to the abandoned dorm,” Minato said.  “And besides, all of the students who disappeared there have come back now that Hinata-san is back.”

“Well, we can skip that one anyway,” Nina said.  “That leaves six, so that we can check ‘em out in groups of two.  So lemme let y’all know your partners! You’ll complete your mission and we’ll meet back here at dinner time!”

She started to point people out around the room.

“The second mystery is the doll in the Obelisk Common room that comes to life if you say her name three times!  Ji-U and Takako, you’ll go meet her.”

“That’s Alice,” Taro said, perking up.  “She’s fun! She likes to duel, and she’s really good, so she’ll probably be great practice.”

“An excuse to break into Obelisk?  Hell yeah,” Ji-U said with a grin as she looked up from her phone.  “Hey, Takako-chan, see if you can find out which room your brother is in.  We’ll leave him a surprise while we’re there.”

Takako flushed, wringing her hands, and it was hard to tell what she thought about that idea.  But she nodded.

“Also make sure you ask her if she’s noticed anything weird around lately,” Nina said.  “Since she’s a maybe Duel Spirit or something, she probably has her ear to the ground, especially about what those Obelisk kids are plotting nowadays.”

Ji-U saluted.  She high fived her sister, and then she and Takako stood up from the table and Ji-U meandered out with Takako scurrying after her.  Nina swung her finger over to Toitoi then.

“The third mystery is the old well where people used to throw their low attack cards,” she said.  “Toitoi, Miu! You guys investigate!”

“Didn’t you tell us that got filled in, and Manjoume Jun took all the monsters that were left there?” Saki said.

“Yeah, but Taro was saying that there could still be traces of like, sad magic there left behind by the monsters,” Nina said.  “That might attract something mean. So let’s just make sure it’s all okay! Micchan, I specifically gave you one that’s pretty easy so you can relax.”

Miu blinked and then gave a tiny smile of acknowledgment.

“Miu appreciates it,” she said, yawning.  “Okay, Toitoi-chan. Let’s go take a nap in the woods.”

“You mean look at the old well,” Toitoi said.

“We can do that too, Miu guesses.”

The pair wandered out of the mess hall, and Nina turned her eyes towards Minato and Saki, the only ones left at their table.

“The fourth mystery is...do you guys remember?”

“No,” Minato said bluntly, though Saki screwed up her face as though she were trying hard to remember.

“The fourth one is the back staircase at the school that has more steps going up than down,” Nina said.  “And supposedly if you stand on the bottom step for too long on the fourth step going up, then when you get to the top of the stairs you’ll be in another dimension.”

“Shouldn’t you have had Miu do that one?  If she ends up in another dimension, she can walk back easy,” Minato said.

“Aha!! So you do believe there could be some truth to it!”

Minato’s cheeks darkened, and Taro couldn’t help but laugh.

“Don’t worry, that’s why we’re in pairs.  If one of ya goes missing, you can go get Miu to get them back,” Nina said.  “Besides, I thought you might _like_ being in a private place with Saki.”

Minato’s cheeks went even darker, and their eyes widened.  Saki blinked, looking too sleepy to really get the message, or maybe too dense.  Taro sniggered behind his hand.

“Fine!” Minato said, shooting to their feet.  “Fine. Okay. Saki, let’s go investigate some fucking stairs.”

“Huh? Okay?” said Saki, blinking away sleep.  Minato bolted off, and Saki had to stumble to keep up.

“What about us?” Eun said.  “I’d like a private place to hang out with Aki-chan too.”

Akiara went beet red, and it looked pretty silly with the four or five pigtails sticking up from her head.

“I was thinking you guys could go talk to Daitokuji,” Nina said.

“Huh?  Daitokuji-sensei’s the fifth mystery?” Mylene said.

“Yeah, the rumor goes that he’s the ghost of an old alchemist, which is actually true, but the story doesn’t tell you that he’s a nerd too,” Nina said.  “Anyway, you’re the best at finding Pharaoh, Eun-senpai. And Daitokuji was the one who ran the experiments at the old dorm, so maybe he’ll have more to share.”

“All right,” Eun said, though she looked disappointed.  She picked the hair ties out of Akiara’s hair and smoothed it back down.  “Wanna go looking for a cat, Aki-chi?”

“Okay,” Akiara said.

They stood up and made their way out.  All that was left was Nina, Mi-Gyeong, Taro, and Mylene.  And as Taro counted the leftover mysteries, he wasn’t sure he liked the options that were left.

“Well, the sixth mystery is the place where the Phantasms were kept before,” Nina said. “And the last one is all the clues that Saito-senpai left behind in her old dorm about a demon she left somewhere on the island.”

“Whoa, cool,” Mi-Gyeong said, eyes lighting up.

Taro could tell by the way that Nina was shifting from foot to foot that she really wanted to try and solve Saito-senpai’s riddles rather than go looking for clues for the old Phantasms.  And Taro remembered that once, he’d wanted to find the old place while the cards had actually been there, just to see them.

But last year...he shivered, ears plastering to his head.  Last year, he’d come face to face with a fragment of Armityle and been wholly aware of how tiny and insignificant he was in comparison.  Stories and monuments and distant tales had not been enough to show him just how terrifying a being the old gods really were. Something in him had dampened after that, he felt.  He was...scared. More scared than he had been even the day he’d died. And he hated it. He was supposed to be the great adventurer, Shiba Warrior Taro. And here he was. Scared of ghosts that weren’t even on the island anymore.

“Mi-Gyeong and I will investigate the Phantasms,” Nina said suddenly.  “I think I might have found a tunnel system that leads right to the old cavern, and there’s probably some books we can pull out of storage in the library.  We’ll have to swim a little to get to the cavern though.”

“Swim to get to a secret cavern??  That sounds so cool!” Mi-Gyeong said, bouncing up and down on the table.  “I’m in!!”

Taro glanced up at Nina.  She sent him a small smile — not her usual big bursting smile, but a kind, awkward one.  He smiled back at her, feeling relief course through him. At least she didn’t think badly of him for being afraid.

“Be careful,” he said.  “Bring your Duel Disks, so you can summon your monsters for help if you need it.”

“No worries!  I’ve got a waterproof bag ready all ready.  And I’ll summon up a friend to swim with us in case we get into a riptide or something,” Nina said.

“So does that mean Taro and I have to take the demon clue journey?” Mylene said.

“Yup!” Nina said.  “Here’s the files. Ji-U and Eun found them left under their mattresses in their new room.”

She pulled a thick manila envelope from her shoulder bag and passed it to Mylene.  Taro hopped up so that he could sit on the same side as xir while xe got the papers out.

“We’re off on our adventure, then!” Nina said, jumping from the table.  “Tell me everything when you get back! Don’t die!”

“Got it,” Taro said, wagging his tail so that she wouldn’t worry.

Nina and Mi-Gyeong scampered off, and Taro leaned over the papers that Mylene spread over the table.  They were covered in post-it notes, scribbled with spooky ink drawings of monsters and pine trees, and Taro could just imagine Saito-senpai trying to make the spookiest looking video-game-esque clues in her room and snickering to herself while Saya-senpai tried to sleep.

“Well, this doesn’t make much sense,” Mylene said, frowning.  “So far, at least.”

Xe laid out all the post it notes in a line.

“What kinda person was this Saito-senpai?” xe asked.  “Seems kinda weird to summon demons to your school.”

“Saito-senpai was a shadow gamer,” Taro said, resting his head on his hands.  “She wanted to play all kinds of spooky demon games.”

“Oh, like those creepypastas on the internet?”

“Yeah, she wanted to prove which ones were true, but also win all of the games,” Taro said.  “I think she just wanted to be really cool.”

Mylene laughed.

“Well, if she actually beat some of those creepy ass games I’ve read about, then she probably was pretty cool,” xe said.  “Okay. Let’s figure out this riddle here. Doesn’t it look like you can fit these post-it notes together? Like a puzzle?”

Xe pushed two together, and sure enough, the cut off line of a pine tree matched the other half.  Taro’s tail wiggled.

“Wow!  I didn’t even notice!”

“I’m pretty good at patterns,” Mylene said.  “Let’s see if we can fit them all together.”

It was about thirty minutes by the time they fit all the post-it notes together into a full image, and a few people stumbled into the mess hall to grab breakfast while they were working.  Once they were finished, an image of a sketchy pine forest with a few creepy, tall black figures with too long arms and fingers and white holes for eyes emerged. Taro stared at it.

“I wonder what this means?” he asked.  “I don’t recognize any landmarks, so I don’t think it’s a map.”

Mylene hummined, rubbing xir chin.  Xir eyes flickered across the post-it notes.  Then xir eyes lit up. Xe pointed to the first one on the right.

“Look!  Isn’t this a number three?”

Taro leaned in.  Sure enough, there was a number hidden in the pine needles.  His tail began to wag faster.

“There’s a four in the next one,” he said, pointing it out.

They searched the image for more numbers.  Mylene wrote them down on another post-it note.

“So what does this mean?” xe asked, looking it over.  “And are they even in the right order?”

“I’m sure they are.  See?” Taro said, pointing at the creepy figures.  “All of them are looking to the left, so I think that means it reads from right to left, like a book.”

“Okay,” Mylene said.  “But what do they mean?”

Taro pawed at some of the other papers.  They were mostly gibberish, like keysmashes, smudged and covered in ink in places.  There were some doodles in the margins like the ones on the post-it notes. One of them looked like it was a cell phone.

“It’s a phone number!” Taro said excitedly.  “Saito-senpai loved doing games where you had to call a spirit.  Once the Answer Man almost tore Saya-senpai’s arm off.”

Mylene shivered, but xe grinned all the same.

“Saito sounds like a real wild card,” xe said.  “I wish I could meet her. Well, do you think there are any other instructions for how to call this number?  Usually these games have rules.”

Taro frowned, staring at the page.  Mylene leaned over it too. Then xir eyes lit up.

“I know this cipher,” xe said.  “I used to love using this cipher!  Give me a second!”

Xe pulled the paper towards xir and began to scribble over the apparent keysmashes.  In a few moments, xe had a list of instructions.

“‘Find the numbers in the woods’,” xe read.  “‘The order is the direction the faces look.’  Nice, we got that already.”

Taro let out a little pant of excitement.

“The next step is to take the phone into a bathroom and turn off all the lights,” xe said.  “We need to watch the mirror while we call.”

“And after that?”

“It says to make absolutely no noise, and not to speak to whatever you see in the mirror,” Mylene said.  “You’ll see that the thing in the mirror comes from somewhere else. If you can guess where that is, you’ll have the next place.”

This was getting a little creepy now.  Maybe looking at the old empty Phantasms place wouldn’t be so bad.

“Do you think that this Saito would bring something actually dangerous to the school?” Mylene said.

“Saito-senpai?” Taro said.  “Oh, definitely. She wouldn’t hesitate if she thought it’d be fun.”

* * *

The phone rang.  Taro wasn’t the one making the call, but he could hear it.  He tried not to squirm too much.

As a rule bathrooms and mirrors weren’t very scary.  The dark wasn’t scary either. He could see in the dark.  Even in a pitch black bathroom, there was enough light coming from under the door that he could see perfectly fine.  Mirrors were just glass, and bathrooms were just places where you did your business. Nothing particularly spooky about that.

Still, despite Mylene acting like xe was totally excited, Taro could definitely smell that xe was nervous, and it was making Taro nervous.  What might come into the mirror? Maybe Saito hadn’t finished setting this up yet, and it would be a dead end.

He heard something pick up the phone, and Mylene sucked in a breath.  Taro’s ears shot straight up, searching for any sign of anything entering the bathroom.  For a few moments, there was nothing. Mylene held the phone to xir ear and waited. Xe didn’t look at Taro, and Taro wasn’t about to make a sound to ask if xe heard anything — from what Taro could hear, there wasn’t anything on the other line.

Something shifted in the mirror.  Taro clapped his hands over his mouth to prevent a yelp from escaping.  He and Mylene hadn’t moved, but there was definitely something in the mirror now.  

Something big and black, vaguely human in shape, like the too-long scribbled figures in Saito’s post-it notes, was standing right behind them.

Oh no.  Oh no. Taro was panicking.

He felt the tremble overtake his body, saw tears bubble into the corners of his eyes from his self in the mirror.  The big black thing with the white holes for eyes leaned down over his shoulder. He couldn’t feel anything but he could almost sense that it was breathing on him.  It was only in the mirror, he reminded himself. It was only in the mirror. It couldn’t hurt him. Mylene stood stock still beside him, phone still pressed to xir ear.

Taro couldn’t breathe.  The thing was moving its hand over his head, brushing against his ears in the mirror.  He still felt nothing but he could see it touching his ears, and it took everything he had not to scream.  He wanted to look behind him and make sure it wasn’t actually there, but he was afraid of losing sight of it.  Oh gods. Oh gods. He couldn’t breathe. He was so so scared. He remembered with a frightening clarity the cold, dark-armored illusion of Yuki-sensei with the cutting golden eyes, the pressure that had pushed down onto him, the malicious glint of his spiked armor, the feeling of being on the verge of dying again.

He was going to scream.  He couldn’t stop it. He was too scared, he was too scared, he was too scared —

Mylene suddenly moved.  Xir leg snapped up, soaring over Taro’s head, and crashing into the mirror.

The mirror shattered.  In the same spinning motion, Mylene threw the door open, and light flooded inside.  

Taro started breathing again.  His vision blinded for a moment, and he had to stay there and pant, dropping into a crouch with his hands over his head, trembling.

“Taro?  Taro-senpai.  Taro, are you okay?”

He felt Mylene put xir hands on his shoulders, and felt suddenly ashamed of the tears rolling down his cheeks.  Mylene was his kohai, and he’d been such a cowardly senpai. He could have gotten them both killed by whatever was in the mirror, and he hadn’t even paid enough attention to figure out the next clue.  And now Mylene had to take care of him while he broke down.

“Hey, hey,” Mylene said, sounding awkward.  “It’s okay, man. We’re okay.”

Taro pressed his face into his hands.

“I’m sorry,” he mumbled.  “I’m sorry, Mylene. I was...I got so scared.  You were so brave.”

Mylene let out a nervous laugh.

“Oh, god, no, I wasn’t,” xe said.  “That was such an impulse. I mean — I don’t even know how we were supposed to banish it, so like, I could have gotten us killed by breaking the mirror without knowing what I was doing.”

Taro whined, curling in on himself.

“I’m supposed to be brave,” he said.  “I was a great adventurer and warrior once.  I didn’t used to be this scared. But...”

He trailed off.  Mylene continued to awkwardly pat his back.  Taro looked down at the shards of mirror on the floor.  Luckily, there was no sign of the monster in them. The light seemed to have scared it off.  And they were going to continue the game to go find that creature? He shuddered. Maybe he’d be scared of mirrors from now on.

“You know, it’s okay to be scared,” Mylene said.  “Actually, it’s pretty smart to be scared of things that can kill you.”

“But if it had done something...it could have hurt you.  I don’t know if I would have stopped it.”

Mylene scratched behind his ears, and he finally looked up.  Mylene gave him an embarrassed smile.

“Sorry” xe said.  “Is that weird for me to do?  I’ve wanted to pet your ears this whole time.”

“No, that feels good actually,” he said, blushing.  “You can keep doing it.”

He closed his eyes with pleasure as xe continued scratching behind his ears.  After a beat, xe spoke again.

“You know what I learned when I was the most scared?” xe said.

“What?”

“That the best way to not be scared is to face things with someone else.  That’s why we did this together. So that if one person freezes, maybe the other will act.  Maybe next time I’ll be the one that freezes up. And I’m pretty sure that if we were actually in danger...you’re brave because you’d protect us even if you’re scared.”

Taro blushed again.  He finally stood up, letting Mylene’s hand slide off his head.  He wiped his eyes quickly.

“I...really haven’t ever had adventures like these with someone,” he admitted.  “I was always exploring by myself. I thought I had to be brave by myself.”

“Definitely not,” Mylene said.  “Adventures are more fun with friends anyway, don’t you think?”

He couldn’t help but smile.  Xe was totally right. He’d never traveled with a party or with friends when he’d been the Shiba Warrior.  Maybe he was a different kind of adventurer now. One who traveled with friends.

“Thank you,” he said.

“Sure thing,” Mylene said.  “Anyway. I’m down to finish this if you are, but if you’re ready to stop, I’ll be ready to stop too.”

“Well, it’s over now, anyway,” he said.  “I don’t know where to go next.”

He was surprised at the grin that crossed xir face.

“I got some clues that might help,” xe said, tapping xir phone.  “I could hear water dripping onto stone on the phone. And that thing looked like a shadow on the wall of a cave.”

Taro’s eyes widened.  His tail started to wag.  He knew where that had to be!

“The mirror pool!” he said.  “That’s the perfect place to fight a mirror monster!”

* * *

It was noon by the time they reached the mirror pool.  Taro had been here before during last year’s exploration — it was in one of the cave systems nearest the school.  It was pretty easy to get too, and in fact, a lot of students wandered down there to toss coins into the water for good luck on tests.

Inside, the cave was still pretty light from the sun that glowed at the top of the natural stairs.  Mylene still had trouble seeing, so Taro guided xir most of the way. Soon, it was dim, and stalactites dripped water from their tips to the ground below.

“This is it,” Mylene whispered.  “This is what I heard.”

“I wonder what kind of game we’ll have to play,” Taro said.

“We can always go back,” Mylene said.  “Tell Yuki-sensei and Andersen-sensei about it.”

It sounded like a good idea, but Taro shook his head.

“No, we can do this,” he said stubbornly.  “Besides, in the time it would take us to find them, someone else might come down here, and we’ve already activated the monster.  We need to take care of it.”

Mylene grinned, xir hand squeezing Taro’s.  Taro led xir forward into the dim light.

Before them, a perfectly circular pool of perfectly still water sat, dark and deep, in front of them.  Taro didn’t know how deep it was, but you couldn’t see any of the coins thrown into it even with a flashlight, he’d checked.

He listened for any sign of anything or anyone around, but all he heard was the water and the soft, natural sounds of earth settling.  He didn’t smell anything out of the ordinary, either, or sense any other Duel Spirits around.

As they walked closer to the pool, a faint shadow seemed to deepen over it.  It almost seemed like something that would fade as they got closer but instead, it got thicker and more visible.  Taro’s stomach turned. There it was. That was the same creature that had been in the mirror. It stood above the water, right in the middle of the pool, staring at them.  Taro’s hair rose on end, and his lips peeled back in a nervous snarl. Mylene’s hand gripped his tightly.

They walked slowly until they were a good four feet away from the pool.  Just out of reach of the monster’s arms, from Taro’s estimation. It stared at them, impassive, just two big white glowing eyes staring at them.

Taro wondered if the rule was still not to talk to the creature.  How did they figure out the game, then? There had to be a game. Saito wouldn’t make this without a game that could be won.

Finally, the creature moved.  It held up one large hand and opened its thick, shadowy fingers.

 _Answer_ , it said, or rather more like it vibrated through Taro’s chest.   _One true answer for every head._

It threw the coins onto the ground.  Two heads appeared. Taro froze up as its eyes bored into him — but then the gaze moved to Mylene.

_Who are you?_

Mylene’s voice shook.

“Mylene Masson.”

The creature seemed to accept the answer.  It looked at Taro.

_Who are you?_

“Inugawa Taro,” Taro gasped, feeling a pressure on his chest.

The creature stared at him.  It shook its head. Taro’s panic spiked.

“That’s a true answer,” he said.  “That’s my name!”

_One try left._

It nodded at the coins, and then at Mylene.  Still panicking, Taro and Mylene looked at each other. Mylene carefully picked up the coins.  Xe tossed them into the air.

They fell down one at a time.  One head was up. The creature seemed to wait.  Mylene hesitated for a long time.

“Why did you say Taro’s answer was wrong?” xe whispered.

_Asked who.  Not name._

Mylene opened her mouth, but Taro squeezed her hand, heart hammering.  Xe only got one question.

The creature’s long arm reached slowly for the coins.  Taro didn’t get a question, it seemed because he’d answered wrong.  But why was his answer wrong? What did that mean, ‘who are you’?

The creature tossed the coins into the air.  Three heads shone on the floor when they fell.  It looked at Mylene first.

_Are you afraid?_

“Oh god, yes,” xe gasped.

It looked at Taro.

_Who are you?_

Taro gaped.  The question again.  And...and he only got one chance?  What did it want to know? Why was Mylene’s answer right, but his wasn’t?

He swallowed.  The fear had him by the throat, now.  He was trembling so badly that he thought he would start to cry.

Then he felt Mylene grip his hand.  He glanced at xir. Xir eyes were wide and frightened, but xe still smiled at him.

 _Together_ , she mouthed.

That’s right.  Taro wasn’t alone.  He looked at the creature, right in the eyes.

“I’m the Great Shiba Warrior Taro,” he said.  “And don’t you forget it.”

The creature stared at him.  For a moment, he panicked. And then it nodded. It stared at him again.

_Are you afraid?_

Taro stared it right in the eyes.  His heart hammered in his chest, and he felt a tremble passing through him, but he felt strong all of a sudden.  Very strong.

“No,” he said.  “I’m not scared of you.”

He was almost shocked when the creature accepted the answer.  It nodded towards the coins, and then to Taro. His turn now. Without releasing Mylene’s hand, he reached down and grabbed the coins.  He threw them into the air.

All three fell to the ground.  Three heads. He got three questions!!  Oh, gosh, he had to think of what to ask quickly.  Something that would be worth it!

“How do we win this game?” he asked.

_Make me lie twice, or tell three truths._

He didn’t know how to make this thing lie, but he’d told two truths already, and so had Mylene.  He wasn’t sure if both of them had to tell three truths, or just one of them. Should that be his next question?  No, he’d learn once they answered again.

“Will you still be here when we finish this game?”

_Only if someone calls for me._

That was good.  As long as they hid the instructions, there was no way someone would just happen to complete all the requirements to summon this guy.  Taro sucked in a breath, thinking of one last question. He remembered, suddenly, why they were doing this — it sounded like something bad was stirring in the abandoned dorm again, and they were training and investigating to see what that might be.

“What’s happening at the abandoned dorm?” he asked.

The creature never blinked.  

 _Nothing_.

Mylene sucked in a breath, and Taro felt a chill pass over him.  He didn’t know how he knew, but he did — the creature had lied.

It reached for the coins again.  Taro bit back a nervous whimper as it threw the coins in the air.  Only one head appeared. It stared at Taro.

_What scares you the most?_

A broad question, and one that Taro didn’t want to divulge to this creature.  But he also had to think about it. What scared him the most? Dying again? Armityle?

He glanced at Mylene, who looked back.  No, he thought. He knew what scared him.

“Having to adventure all alone again,” he said.

The creature let out a low sigh.  Clearly, the game was over. Taro had won.

_You have won a truth.  I cannot lie. What would you know?_

Taro tightened his grip on Mylene.

“What is happening at the abandoned dorm?” he asked again.

The creature still didn’t blink.  Slowly, it began to sink away into the water, taking the coins with it.

_Old things return.  Old things you know._

Taro knew he’d only won one truth, but he shouted after it anyway.

“What old things??  Is it Armityle? Is Armityle coming back?”

The creature was in the water up to its eyes, now, and they sank beneath the water, going dark as they disappeared.

_Armityle is already here._

They were alone in the cavern.  Only the water dripped onto the floor.

“Taro?” Mylene whispered.

Taro’s mind was surprisingly quiet.  He inhaled sharply.

Armityle.  Here. Did it mean here in this cave?  At this school? Simply out and about in the universe?

He looked at Mylene, who was looking at him with concern.

He smiled for xir reassuringly.

“Well,” he said.  “It can’t beat us if we fight it together, right?”

 


	15. Flower Spell!! - Harue's Garden

Taiki tried to cast the spell again.  This time, the flower stood straight up, and the petals unfolded — only, it was still completely green, and not at all the bright pink this tulip should be.  Taiki sighed, sitting back on his hands. Geez. When was he going to get the hang of this spell?

“Oh, Taiki-senpai.”

He looked up to see Takako on the path, her heavy bag slung over her shoulders.  She’d come to class with the same heavy essentials kit that he’d collected, making Taiki finally feel validated.  Ren-senpai couldn’t tease them anymore, since now he was the only one who didn’t carry it around, and he’d been cowed into carrying at least a crystal set with him by Dawn-sensei.

“Oh, hi, Takako-chan,” he said, hopping up.  Takako was a little taller than him, and it kind of frustrated him, but he hid that.  It wasn’t her fault. Someday he’d get bigger. “Where are you headed?”

She blushed.

“Probably the same as you,” she mumbled.  “I was going to go practice that flower spell.”

She smiled at Taiki’s green tulip, wringing nervously at the sling of her bag.

“You look like you’ve gotten really far already.  You’re a great magician.”

“Not that good,” Taiki said with a sigh.  “I can’t get it to bloom in full color. And it goes right back to a bud after a while.”

Sure enough, as he spoke, the tulip curled back up into a stalk again.  He sighed.

“I can’t get it to go to the first step at all,” Takako said.  “Um...do you want to practice together, maybe?”

“That sounds like a great idea,” Taiki said, brightening.  He snatched up his crystals and powders, and tucked his Natura Strawberry plush back into the little sling he’d made for it.

“Let’s go a little farther in.  I saw some trout lilies, and Dawn-sensei said those are good for practicing because they’re less resistant to magic.”

“Okay,” Takako said shyly.

They wandered into the woods a little father, keeping their eyes out for trout lily leaves.  Soon, they stumbled across a whole thick carpet of them.

“Perfect,” Taiki said.  “Do you remember the spell components?”

“One vial of clean earth, and a bit of granite,” she recited.  She set her bag down on the ground and began to dig inside. She came out with two small vials, one full of dirt, and one with a piece of rock.  She also withdrew her staff. She’d gotten hers bonded during their second class: it was a small dark green charm bag, like the ones you’d buy at shrines, and she’d tied it by the straps to the end of a carved stick so as not to lose it.

Taiki took out his plush as he set up his own components.  Takako watched him, copying what he did, and he felt very self-conscious.  He hoped that he didn’t make any mistakes. He’d never been any kind of teacher before.

He sprinkled the dirt over the bit of granite, trying to sense the power in the natural elements.  In his other hand, his plush got warmer, and he inhaled, drawing in the magic that began to fill it up, mixing it with his own, and then breathing it back out through the staff.

A few small white blossoms poked out of the leaves.  He burst into a grin.

Takako got one small blossom, and it was clear she was disappointed that she’d only gotten one rather than the handful that Taiki had conjured.

“That was a great job!” he said, trying to reassure her.  “You did —”

They both froze at the sound of very near by laughter.  For a moment, Taiki was positive that someone had snuck up on them, and he tried to cover up their magic with his body.  But he realized then that the voices were a bit away, through the woods somewhere. He heard the faint rumble and snap of voices, and another laugh.  It didn’t sound like a nice laugh.

They exchanged a glance.  Takako’s eyes were wide with fright, and she looked pale.  Taiki felt nervous, too, but he was a senpai now! He had to be tough and reliable!

He squared his shoulders, sticking his plush back into its sling, and marching after the voices.  Takako scurried after him with a squeak.

It didn’t take long for them to stumble over the scene.  All of Taiki’s initial determination faltered a bit.

Four tall Obelisk students stood in a loose half circle, facing a tall boy with a red jacket tied around his waist.  It took Taiki a moment to remember him — that was Onaga Harue, one of the first years. He was way tall, even taller than the Obelisks who looked like they might be third- or second-years.  He had soft brown skin and a very round, sweet sort of face, his aqua hair cut neatly over his head. He had his lips pressed tightly together right now, though, and his arms crossed.

Taiki’s eyes flickered down to the ground, and he felt suddenly very sad.  There were a bunch of trampled flowers stomped into the ground.

“What’s the matter?  Are you going to cry?” one of the Obelisks shouted at Harue.  “Cry over your stupid flowers!”

He kicked one of the fallen sunflowers, and Harue looked even tenser.

“You’ve done enough,” he said, tightly.  “Please leave.”

“Please leave,” one of the Obelisk mimicked in a high pitched voice.  “Why don’t  _ you _ leave, dropout?  Leave the school!”

“It’s you low achievers that drags this whole school’s reputation down,” another said.  “Maybe if you studied instead of messing around with flowers, you wouldn’t be in this mess.”

“H-hey!” Taiki shouted.

He withered as all eyes turned to him, but then stood up straight again.  Harue might be bigger than him, but he was the senpai here, and he needed to stick up for the younger students.  Takako squeaked and hid her face, but Taiki tried to look brave. He marched out there, standing next to Harue and feeling very small next to him.

“Leave him alone,” Taiki said.  “You’d think that your so-called better education would keep you busier than this!  Don’t you have anything better to do than mess with perfectly good flowers!”

For a minute, he thought maybe he’d shamed them.  But then they all started laughing.

“I’m sorry!  All I could hear was squeaking,” one of them laughed.  “Man, how old  _ are _ you?”

“Are you even old enough to be in high school, runt?” another giggled, wiping a tear from her eye.

Taiki’s face heated.  He almost felt like crying.  They all kept laughing, and for a minute, his hands twitched towards his plush.

“Aww, look, he’s even got a comfort friend,” one of them sneered, starting them all off laughing again.

Taiki almost,  _ almost _ reached for the plush.  He didn’t know any spells that could hurt, but his magic was rushing in him with all this emotion, and he just wanted them all to go  _ away _ —

Takako grabbed his hand before he could grab the plush.  He looked back at her, seeing her white face, and realized that if he did that...he could make things worse for everyone.  He couldn’t cast magic in front of these nerds.

“Go ahead and laugh,” he said instead.  “Just leave us alone!”

“Get going,” Harue said.  “There’s no more flowers for you to ruin anymore.  You’re done.”

One of the four mimicked Harue again, and they all laughed.  But then, thankfully, they all filtered off, still laughing at their destruction.  Taiki’s shoulders slumped as soon as they were gone, nothing left to force him to keep them straight.  Tears bubbled in his eyes again.

“I’m sorry, Harue-san,” he said.  “I wasn’t much help.”

Harue smiled at him though when he looked up — he had a crooked sort of smile, one that lifted up more on one side of his lips than the other.

“Nah, you’re good,” he said.  “Thanks for sticking up for me back there.  I can tell it was rough.”

He patted Taiki on the shoulder, and Taiki was reminded of just how small he was compared to Harue.  Ugh. It was no fair, being shorter than a first-year!

“Your poor flowers,” Takako said, sounding like she was going to cry.

Harue sighed.  He looked out over the ruined garden.  Roses, tulips, sunflowers, pansies, and violets were all stomped into the dirt, their poor stalks snapped and their petals trampled.  He knelt down and tried to help a sunflower stand back up, but it didn’t work.

“Well, flowers will always come back one way or another,” he said, quirking a smile at them.  “Cycle of life and all that. They can’t stop nature from running its course, at least.”

Taiki crouched down and cupped a smashed lily.  

“You had so many,” he said.  “Did you grow all of them?”

Harue propped up another lily and sighed when it fell over.

“Yeah,” he said.  “It’s pretty relaxing, you know?  And I have kind of a knack for it.”

Taiki tried to remember what unit that Harue was in.  He wasn’t a magician or a psychic duelist. He thought maybe he was in Miu’s unit.

“Is that one of your...Osiris skills?” Taiki said, fumbling for a better way to express it.

Harue chuckled.

“I guess a little bit?  I’m a Dimension Walker. Actually, to be honest, I was raised in the spirit world for most of my life.”

Takako’s eyes widened, and Taiki’s head whipped towards Harue with a shock.

“Really?” Takako said.  “I didn’t know that was possible.”

Harue nodded.  He grunted as he leaned back to sit on the ground, leaning his hands on the dirt behind him and surveying the damage to his garden.

“My birth mother was really sick when I was young,” he said.  “She was a spirit seer, too. She tried her best, but she couldn’t hold on.  When she died, her spirit partner managed to collect enough energy to pull me across to the spirit world.  I’ve lived with my moms ever since — well, at least until Yuki-sensei found out and asked if I’d like to come to school here.”

“Wow,” Taiki said, eyes wide.  “I had no idea. So where in the spirit world did you come from?”

“You remember Chorus of Sanctuary from our field trip?” Harue said.  “I came from pretty near there. The Kingdom of Flowers borders Chorus of Sanctuary, and that’s where my moms live.”

He smoothed out another big stalk of a lily, and this one stood upright.  A bright, excited expression lit up his face at the single happy flower.

“Did your moms teach you to garden?” Takako asked, gently cupping a tulip.

“Yup,” he said.  “It was kind of their thing.  And staying in the spirit world meant that some of rubbed off on me.  I’m fully human, but some of it kind of lingered. Gives me a pretty mean green thumb.”

He grinned, giving them a thumbs up as though as a demonstration.  Taiki and Takako smiled back. Taiki rubbed his fingers against some of the leaves of the trampled flowers.  An idea occurred to him, perking him up.

“Hey!” he said.  “Why don’t Takako-chan and I try to help revive your flowers?”

Takako looked at him with a sharp anxiety.  Harue looked up with surprise, looking confused.

“How would you do that?”

“Takako-chan and I were just practicing on a flower blooming spell,” Taiki said, excited now.  “Maybe we can cast it on your garden, and some of them might come back.”

“I’m not good at it yet,” Takako said quickly.

Harue rubbed the back of his neck, considering it.  Then he smiled.

“Hey,” he said.  “Can’t make things any worse, right?  Give it a try.”

Takako protested a little more with a flap of her hands and a mumble, but she gave in while Taiki was pulling out his supplies.  She reluctantly pulled out some of her vials and her staff. Harue stood up and stepped out of the way of the trampled flowers, letting Takako and Taiki set up.  Taiki repeated his practice from earlier, sprinkling the dirt over the granite, coaxing energy out of it and into his staff, where he could imbue it with some of his own soul power, and then coaxing it back out.

It worked — well, a little bit at least.  Three sunflowers rose back up out of the ground, and a few pansies popped back up.  Takako managed to get a single rose to curl back open. Harue let out a whistle, his eyes lighting up.

“That’s great!” he said.  “You brought some of them back!”

“Barely,” Taiki said, a bit disappointed.  “I’m sorry, Harue, I probably got your hopes up...”

“No!!  I mean, yeah, but this is great!  I didn’t think I’d be able to save any of them.”

He patted a sunflower lightly, smiling.

“This one’s one of my mom’s favorite flowers, you know?” he said.  “It’s a little bit of home. You brought it back, and I’m really grateful.”

Taiki blushed.  Takako rubbed her toe into the ground.  Then she sat down at the edge of the garden.

“Tell me more about your moms,” she said.  “What are they like?”

Harue’s eyes lit up.  He sat down next to her, and after a beat, Taiki sat down on his other side.

“Talaya was my mother’s spirit partner,” he said.  “She’s known as the Princess of Cherry Blossoms, and she’s one of the four rulers of the Kingdom of Flowers.  All four of my moms are, actually.”

“Four moms?  That’s a lot of moms,” Taiki said.

“Five plus my birth mom,” Harue said, sounding quite proud of himself.  “Talaya is pretty stern and traditional, but she’s a softie when you get to know her.  It’s pretty easy to convince her to let me do things.”

He chuckled, and Taiki couldn’t help but smile at the love in Harue’s voice.

“Then there’s Chirubimé, the Princess of Autumn Leaves.  She’s super laid-back about everything and loves pulling pranks.  No one can really call her out on it either since she’s the princess and all.”

He laughed, looking off into the distance.

“Mariña is the one who loves Sunflowers.  She’s the Princess of them too,” he said. “She’s pretty haughty, but don’t tell her I said that.”

He snickered, and Takako and Taiki both smiled too.

“She’s persnickety about things and can be a little hard to reason with, but she’s also super protective.  You do  _ not _ want to get her mad, or threaten her kingdom.”

His eyes took on a distant cast, then, as though he were very far away.

“And then there’s Tytannial,” he said.  “The Princess of Camellias. She’s kind of the leader of the four of them, as much as they’re supposed to be equal.  She’s the most traditionally motherly: very soft and kind and sweet. She’s always encouraging me to eat more than I should.”

“Sounds like my grandma,” Taiki said.

Harue laughed a little.

“Yeah, that sounds about right,” he said.

“Do you miss them?” Takako asked.

Harue’s smile faded just a little.  He pulled his knees up to his chest as a light breeze stirred the woods.

“Yeah,” he said.  “I do. There’s no real good way of contacting people over dimensions yet, you know?  I can’t just video call them.”

Takako quietly put a hand on his arm.  They sat in the quiet for a while, watching the wind rustle the trampled flowers.

“We might not have been able to bring them back with magic,” Takako said.  “But maybe we can help you replant more flowers?” 

“Yeah,” Taiki said.  “And this time, we can set up maybe some illusions so that the Obelisk students will get confused when they try to find it!”

Harue’s smile came back.

“Thanks,” he said.  “Actually, I think that’d be fun.  If you really want to garden with me, I’d love to have some company.”

Takako smiled big.  She stood up, rolling back imaginary sleeves.

“I’m not very good at gardening,” she said. “But please teach me, Harue-sensei.”

“Me too!” said Taiki, jumping up.  “This will be fun.”

Harue stayed on the ground for a few moments, just smiling.  Then he stood up with a grunt, nodding.

“Okay,” he said.  “Let’s get to work, then!”


	16. Mid-Term Time! Saki's Partner is...???

“Hold onto your pickles everyone because I’ve got the SCOOP!” 

Nina loud voice crashed over the decidedly very sleepy cafeteria as she exploded through the doors, waving a paper over her head.  Saki groaned, blinking to try and get the grogginess out of her eyes. She’d stayed up far too late last night studying for midterms, and Chronos had also given them an essay to write which had kept her up even later.

Nina clambered up on top of a table, much to the annoyance and soft sleepy swears of similarly affected late night studiers as she nearly stepped on their breakfasts.

“The dueling midterm was just revealed!” she said, waggling the paper over her head.  “It’s tag duels again!”

A few people groaned, and a few others let out faint whoops or a spatter of clapping.  Saki let out a sigh of relief. There’d been a rumor going around that the dueling midterm was going to be a series of those really hard ‘win in one turn’ simulations, and she’d been struggling practicing them for days.  Tag duels were easier.

“Did they post partners and matches yet?” Minato called.

“Yeah!  I couldn’t memorize everybody’s, but everybody’s posted up on the board at the school already!  Oy, Reina-chan!! I’m with you, by the way! We’re up against some Ra kids!”

Reina smiled, waving back at Nina. 

“Against Ra?” Saki said, blinking.  “We’re not doing it by class this year?”

“Looks like no,” said Nina.  She plopped herself to sit on the table in between Anani and Morgan, putting her feet on the bench.  “From what I saw it was all mixed. We’re all paired up with someone in our class, but some people are dueling pairs from different classes.”

“That could be more difficult,” Minato said, humming and rubbing their chin.  “We don’t know the strategies or deck types of the other classes as well.”

Saki nodded, her mind already whirling.  Who would her partner be? Someone in Osiris, which would be good; she knew most of the decks and strategies of people in Osiris, and she could start planning to work on how to work with her partner.  It would be too much to hope for to be with Miu again, of course, which was too bad. They’d been working on tag duel strategies together in case it ever came up. The only difficulty could be if she was paired with a first-year she didn’t know well...

Minato waved their hand in front of Saki’s face and she startled back to herself.  They grinned at her.

“Already in strategy mode, huh?” he said.

She blushed.

“Yeah, well, the earlier you start the better you’re likely to do,” she said.  

“Why don’t you wait until you see who your partner is?” Minato said.  “Then you can have more focus.”

“Great idea!  Let’s go check!” she said, standing up.

Minato tugged her back down.

“Eat your breakfast first, speed demon,” they said with a breathy snort.  “Then we can all go together.”

Saki blushed, but she went back to eating as directed.  It was hard to stop her thoughts from whirling though. Who would her partner be this year?  She’d need to find them so they could work on strategies quickly — there were only two days until midterms, after all.

* * *

Saki felt her stomach drop out as she stared at the board.  It was early, but there were already people crowded around it, pushing and shoving, a few people swearing as they tried to get close to see who they were paired with.  Saki hung back with Minato, Miu, and Taro. She’d tried to push a little closer, but an Obelisk had given her a dirty look and she’d shrunk back.

“Can you see, Taro?” she asked.

“I see my name,” he said, standing on tip toes.  “Looks like I’m with Ji-U-senpai. We’re dueling a Ra Yellow pair too.”

He squinted.

“Oh, I see yours too, Minato.  You’re with Keiko-chan against an Obelisk pair.”

“Ugh,” Minato groaned.  “She won’t take it seriously at all.  And  _ Obelisk _ ?  They’re just going to be assholes about it.”

Miu patted their arm reassuringly.

“The best way to play with Keiko is to either bribe her with candy or make it sound like you don’t think she can win,” Miu said.  “Miu knows from experience.”

The crowd parted a bit, and Taro was able to slip in between a few people to get a look at the board.  Saki tried to follow, but it closed up around him, and they had to wait few minutes for him to scurry back.

“Okay!  Micchan, you’re with Toitoi, and you’re up against Ra Yellow — actually, one of your opponents is Kaede-chan.”

“Oh!” Saki said with a smile. “That will be fun, Miu.  Kaede is a fun person to duel.”

Miu nodded, looking quite pleased with herself.

“Did you see me?” she asked Taro.

She didn’t like the way Taro bit his lip.

“Just tell me,” Saki said.  “It can’t be that bad; I mean, we’re all friends at Osiris, and Obelisk isn’t too bad...”

She trailed off as Taro continued to look uncomfortable.

“Well,” he finally said.  “You’re right. You’re against Obelisk.  It’s...Kylie Harbison and someone else.”

Saki’s stomach twisted.  She remembered Kylie now — the girl with the dark blue side ponytail, who’d been harrassing Osiris that day, the one that Kaede told them to watch out for.  She’d tried her best to avoid her since then.

“And who’s my partner?” she said.

Taro looked really uncomfortable now, but this time he answered with only the barest hesitation.

“Matsushita Haruka-san,” he said.

Saki’s heart dropped down into her knees.  For a moment, she just stared at Taro, mouth hanging open.

She’d gone over a hundred possibilities for her team make up for midterms, and not once had it occurred to her that Haruka was an option.  Oh  _ no _ .  This was...this was the worst.  She couldn’t tag duel with Haruka!!

“I’d...been meaning to ask,” Minato said, looking at Saki.  “What’s been going on between you two?”

“She’s kind of mean,” Miu said.

“Well, yeah, we’ve all had a bit of a prickly time with her,” Minato said.  “She’s definitely bitchy. But during the field trip...what did she say to you?”

Saki didn’t want to talk about it.  Her stomach kept doing flip flops even thinking about it.  

“It was...just more of the same,” she mumbled.  “You know. The way she thinks we’re all freaks.”

“There had to be more to it than that,” Minato said, pushing a little harder.  

Saki bit her lip hard, feeling like she was close to drawing blood.

“She kicked Angel,” she said.  “He got too close to her and she just freaked out.  She kicked him and yelled at me to keep him away from her.  I told her to apologize for hitting him, but she just...”

She trailed off, realizing that she’d been rambling.  Tears bubbled in her eyes and she quickly covered her face with her hands.  Minato’s hand rested lightly on her shoulder.

“Sorry,” they murmured.  “I shouldn’t have pushed.”

“No,” Saki mumbled.  “It’s okay.”

She just couldn’t get it out of her head.  The harsh way that Haruka had glared at her, the way her eyes had snapped to Ji-U and flinched away when Ji-U tried to calm her down, her snapping at the Elemental Mistress who was supposed to be taking them around...and then her dark eyes, glaring furiously at Saki.

_ “If you keep trusting these monsters you keep around you, you’re going to be the one who’s hurt.” _

Angel pressed against her leg, in response to her distress.  She looked down quickly through her tears. His big black eyes stared up at her.  He let out the tiniest yipping sound. She could tell it was supposed to be reassuring, and she forced a smile, wiping at her eyes.

“I guess there’s no help for it,” she said.  “I’ll have to do my best.”

“You tell me if she bothers you,” Minato said.  “If she does something that upsets you again...tell me.  Or at least tell Yuki-sensei or Andersen-sensei. I’m sure they can help.”

“Of course,” Saki said.  “I will.

* * *

It took her most of the day to find Haruka.  Keiko was little help, waving her hands around and saying she wasn’t Haruka’s keeper, and that Haruka didn’t like her anyway so why would she tell Keiko where she was going?  And Saki didn’t want to ask Angel or the other spirits in Osiris to look for her, since it was clear that Haruka didn’t want anything to do with them. Honestly, how was she at this school when she could see spirits and she hated them all so much?

Finally, Saki found her in the back of the library, flipping through a book with her cheek resting on her hand, looking as sour as ever.  Saki’s heart did a few flip flops. Then she inhaled, and exhaled. Haruka would want to pass her midterms too, right? Maybe they could make a truce for now.

Haruka’s eyes flickered up to her as Saki approached, and her lips immediately curled.  She slammed her book shut and made to pick it up as she pushed away from the table.

“Hey, wait,” Saki said, desperate.  “Just — you know about midterms, right?”

Haruka hesitated, arm curling around the book.  She glanced at Saki with one eye, her other covered by her heavy bangs.  Saki fumbled for a moment again. This was ridiculous! She was supposed to be the senpai here.

“You and I are paired,” Saki said.

Haruka’s lip curled.

“Yeah,” she said.  “I noticed.”

She started to turn away again.  Saki stepped forward.

“Please!  Just wait,” she said.  “I know — I know the two of us don’t get along.  But at least...at least let’s take this test seriously, all right?  It doesn’t have anything to do with Osiris, or our powers. You want to pass too, right?  The least we can do is work together a little.”

Haruka actually rolled her eyes.

“And I’ll bet you think we’re going to become best friends, then, right?”  Her eyes flickered down to the ground, and she scowled at the sight of Angel.  “Just give it up. I’m going to duel my way during the midterm. Just do what you do best — put your blind faith in your monsters.”

Saki bristled, then, her shoulders tensing up.

“And what’s wrong with that?” she blurted.  “What is with you?? Angel’s been there for me since I was a kid!  The Duel Spirits are our friends!”

“Oh, really?” Haruka said.  She turned towards Saki, cocking an eyebrow.  “That’s what you think? That we can be friends with the monsters that inhabit another dimension?”

“Don’t say it like that!”

“Like what?  Like the truth?”

“You say it like they’re some horror movie abominations!  They’re not! Duel Spirits are just as varied and individualistic as humans!”

Haruka flung the book in her arms to the table, letting up a loud crack sound that made the person at the far end look up and scowl at them.

“Even if that’s true, what the hell makes you think you can trust them?” Haruka said.  Her eyes were actually wide now, her chest heaving with an angry distress. “They’re magic, unbelievably powerful creatures! Even the most weak Duel Spirit still has way more power than a human! Why do you think creatures like that would want to be our friends??  What do you think they want from us?”

“They’re  _ friends _ !” Saki cried, not even worried about the fact that they were in a library anymore, or that there were probably people around who would think this subject was crazy.  “Friends don’t  _ want _ anything from you!  They’re just your  _ friends _ !”

“Why would a monster of unbelievable power ever want to be friends with a human?” Haruka shot back.  “Are you really so stupid and naive? That you think that thing isn’t using you?”

She jabbed a finger in Angel’s direction.  Angel hissed, hackles raising as he wrapped a protective tail around Saki’s ankle.  Saki was about to start crying.

“What’s wrong with you?” she gasped, shaking slightly.  “How can you judge every single Duel Spirit at once like that?”

Haruka just scowled at her, shaking her head.

“You’re so stupid,” she said.  “You’re all so fucking stupid.”

She turned on her heels and stormed off.  This time, Saki was in no hurry to go after her.  She just stood there, shaking, trying not to cry. Angel vibrated reassuringly against her leg.  She crouched down next to him so that she could tighten her fingers into his fur. He was in a mostly insubstantial state at the moment, so it felt like trying to pet liquid gauze, but it was still comforting.  Her tears kept dripping down through him and onto the floor as he tried to nuzzle her face and lick the tears away.

“Saki-chan?  You okay?”

Saki gasped, eyes widening.  She shot to her feet and wobbled.  Before she could fall, though, a hand grasped her arm to steady her.

“A-Ashikaga-senpai?” she said.  It was the older Obelisk boy from before that she’d met in the library.  Now that he was right next to her, she was vividly aware of how much taller he was than her.

He smiled at her gently.

“Just Kakon,” he said.  “You all right?”

Saki quickly rubbed at her eyes.

“I’m fine,” she said, coughing a bit.  “I’m guessing I can’t pass this off as allergies, huh?”

“No, you and your...friend were pretty loud,” he said.

Saki flushed.  And then she felt a brief stab of panic.  Had the whole library heard them arguing about Duel Spirits?  Had she accidentally spilled the beans about Osiris to the whole school with that fight?  She sent a surreptitious glance to the only other person in view in the library. They were huffily putting their books away.  She saw a yellow jacket tied around their waist as they swept off. Maybe they hadn’t been listening to the argument?

“Did you...hear it?” she asked Kakon, flushing.

“Mostly just heard the yelling.  Not much of the content,” he said, swiping his bangs back from his face.  “Sounded like a pretty nasty fight.”

“It was a little bad,” Saki admitted.

“Want to talk about it?”

She really couldn’t.  She shook her head quickly.

“Oh, no, I don’t want to trouble you. It was stupid, anyway.  We’re — tag partners for the midterms, and we have different ideas about how to duel.”

Kakon’s eyes lit with understanding, and he nodded.

“Oh, man, I feel you.  My partner for midterms is a real screwball.  It’s gonna be tough.”

He tilted his head at her.

“I kinda thought that Osiris was a little more tight knit than that, though,” he said.  “On account of it being smaller. I guess there’s still conflict there, too, huh?”

“Yeah,” Saki said, sighing.  “I’m...I’m worried.”

Kakon smiled at her.  He put a hand to her shoulder, and she looked up.

“Hey,” he said.  “Just breathe, all right?”

She did as instructed, inhaling once, and letting it out.

“There ya go,” he said with a crooked smile.  “Now listen: it’s going to be rough to get along with everybody.  But you just stick to your guns. Keep doing what you believe you have to.  You’ll get through to her eventually.”

“You think so?” Saki said.

He winked, and Saki felt a little warmth come to her cheeks along with her smile.

“I have absolutely no idea,” he said.  “But I think no matter what, you should stick to your convictions.  I think last year proved that, don’t you?”

Last year?  Oh, he must be talking about the graduation duel with Saya.  She nodded.

“Thank you, Kakon-senpai,” she said.  “I’ll do my best.”

* * *

“Great job, you guys!” Yuki-sensei called, smiling as he took some notes on a clipboard while the last tag duelists hopped down and made their way back to the stands.  “Great showing out there. Okay, next duelists for group G! Green side, Kylie Harbison and Quach Dinh! Pink side, Yamaguchi Saki and Matsushita Haruka!”

Saki’s heart was fit to explode out of her ribs as she made her way out of the stands.  Haruka was already standing near the stairs to the field, and she was climbing up before Saki had even reached the end.

Minato grabbed her hand before she got out, though, and she glanced down at them.  They sent her a small smile.

“I’m rooting for you,” they said.

Saki managed a smile.   She nodded, but she was too sick to say anything.  Minato squeezed her hand and then let her go. She hurried around to the field entrance, and scurried up to the opposite side of pink end from Haruka.  Kylie and her partner, Dinh, were already there. Saki hadn’t met Dinh before, but he looked like he was probably a first-year, with a bit of a baby face and light brown skin, wavy black hair almost covering one eye that made him look a bit like the lead singer of a boyband.  He had a pretty nice smile, which was surprisingly cheerful as he winked at Saki, as opposed to Kylie’s murderous scowl.

Saki glanced quickly to Yuki-sensei, as though she could send up a silent cry for help — the malice that was streaming out of Kylie and Haruka on both sides of her was almost suffocating.

Yuki caught her eye as he looked up, and for a moment, he paused, frowning.  He sent her a questioning look.

Suddenly, Saki felt awful for drawing attention to herself.  Everyone else had dealt with their assignments! She could too.  She looked away from him, and tried to focus on the feeling of Angel near her feet.  She sucked in a steadying breath.

Yuki hesitated a moment longer, but then he continued.

“All right, remember everyone — we want to see good use of strategy and especially teamwork,” he said.  “Winning is not the easiest way to a passing grade — working together is. So let’s see a good duel, all right?”

Saki inhaled.  Okay. She could do this.  Just duel the way she always had.  She’d assist Haruka if she could, but she didn’t know Haruka’s strategies, so it would be hard.  Even if Haruka didn’t like her...Saki would duel like she wanted to. And that meant taking care of her partner.

“Coin toss is...Matsushita will be going first.  Then Quach, then Yamaguchi, and then Harbison. Everyone, duel!”

Saki turned on her Duel Disk, and the stadium roared with the cheers from the other students in group G.  Saki heard a few Obelisks shouting for Kylie to end the Osiris, and she decided to block them out too.

“My turn,” Haruka said, in an almost bored voice.  

What kind of cards did she use, anyway?  If she hated Duel Spirits so much...

“I set one card face down.  Turn end.”

Dinh didn’t respond right away.  He startled as Kylie hissed at him.

“Oh, you’re already done?” he said, looking surprised.  “Wow, sorry. Efficient!”

He winked, and Haruka didn’t even flinch.  Looking a bit put out, Dinh drew his first card.

“All right, great hand!” he said, flashing a perfect white smile.  “I summon Batteryman Charger from my hand!”

The air snapped and crackled with static electricity, and Dinh’s monster appeared before him. It looked like a little elf made out of giant pink batteries, and its eyes glowed and sparked as lighting leaped from the ends of its horizontal head.

“Charger gains three hundred attack for every Thunder monster on the field,” Dinh said.  “And then I activate its other effect — when it’s summoned, I can special summon a Batteryman from my hand.  So let’s bring out another  _ electrifying _ friend.  Here comes Batteryman AA!”

A second creature made of batteries sparkled and crackled onto the field, making whining sounds as its eyes flashed.  Saki heard a few cries from the stands that might have been a fan club, and Dinh winked towards them. Someone screamed, and Saki thought she saw someone swoon.  Clearly, this was the Obelisk heartthrob.

“Charger gains another three hundred attack from the new Thunder type monster, and AA gets one thousand attack due to its own effect,” Dinh said with another wink and a pose.  “I’ll then set four cards, and that’s the end of my turn. Take it away, love.”

Saki blushed as he realized he was talking to her.  She wasn’t sure if this meant not all of Obelisk hated her, or if this was just Dinh’s natural state of being.  She shook the thought off. She just needed to duel.

“My turn,” she said.  “Draw!”

It was a good hand!  And she’d be able to defend from the Batterymen with this.

“First, I summon Buster Whelp of the Destruction Swordsmaster!” Saki said.

Angel jumped from her feet, leaping onto the field and becoming visible to the rest of the viewers as the holograms turned on.  He hummed with excitement for the fight to come.

“When Buster Whelp is summoned, I can add a Destruction Sword card from deck to hand,” she said.  “I add Buster Blader, the Destruction Swordsmaster! And then, I activate Buster Whelp’s other effect: I can tribute it to summon a Buster Blader from my hand!”

Angel sat back and let out a yipping cry to the ceiling, spreading his wings.  Then he turned to light, and the light glowed and swelled to form her light-armored knight.  It swung its sword over its shoulders, and let out a huff, resting easily between her and the Batterymen.

_ And this will help me protect Haruka, with her empty field _ , Saki thought.  “I set one card face down!  Since I can’t attack this turn, I end my turn!”

“About time,” Kylie sighed, drawing her own first card.  “You took so long for such a useless turn. Feels like you already know you’re going to lose.”

Saki flushed.  She wasn’t sure what to say in response to that.  Luckily, Yuki-sensei did.

“Let’s keep the trash talk down,” he called.  “A bit of banter’s all right, but keep actual insults out or you’ll be marked down.”

Kylie rolled her eyes, as though marks were the least of her worries.

“I activate the spell card Chosen One,” she said.  “I select one Monster card and two non-Monster cards in my hand.  You select one — if it’s a monster, I can special summon it.”

Saki’s lips parted.  What an interesting card... She shot a look at Haruka, wondering how they were meant to choose between the two of them.  She also sort of wondered if this was cheating — she could sort of see the shimmer of the monster spirit coming through the card that was the monster.  All they had to do was choose one that wasn’t that one.

“You get to choose,” Kylie said, shooting the question at Haruka.  “So what’s it going to be, first-year? Are you going to choose right?”

Haruka barely even blinked.  She pointed directly to the monster card.  Oh no, could she not see the shimmer that Saki could?  She was less trained in spirit seeing after all...

“Too bad,” Kylie said, with a vicious smile.  “You picked it out. I’ll special summon Snow Dragon to the field.”

A small, fat dragon carved from ice congealed before them and hardened into a cold ice.  It let out a thick, phlegmy cough with a breath of frost.

“I activate one of my face down cards!” Dinh shouted.  “Inferno Reckless Summon!”

The card flipped up and glowed.

“When a monster with fifteen hundred or less attack is summoned, the summoner can special summon as many monsters as possible with the same name.  And then the opponent can special summon monsters with the same name as ones on their field, too!”

Someone else screamed Dinh’s name like they were at a rock concert, and he struck a pose with his hand over one eye.  Saki, however, was thinking about her field. Her Buster Blader monster counted as a regular Buster Blader! This could be good for her!

“I’ll summon two more Snow Dragons from my deck,” Kylie said.

“And I’ll summon two more Buster Bladers from my deck, too!” Saki said.

Two more Snow Dragons rolled onto the field next to the first, and Saki’s twin Buster Bladers, bigger and more hulking than the more streamlined Destruction Swordsmaster before her, cut through the air to alight on the field.

“But!” Dinh said with another wink.  “Then I activate my trap card Solemn Judgement to negate the summon and destroy all special summoned monsters!”

What the heck??  Saki threw her arms up in front of her face as both Buster Bladers shattered, and both new Snow Dragons melted onto the stage.

“When Snow Dragon is destroyed, I can put an Ice Counter onto any monster on the field,” Kylie said.  “So it looks like Buster Blader is about to get a little chillier.”

Two icicles sprouted out of Buster Blader’s elbow and knee respectively, spreading ice outwards against its metallic shell.  Saki could hear a faint heavy breathing, as though it were struggling to stay warm.

“And then I’ll discard one card to activate Raigeki Break!” Dinh said.  “To destroy the last Snow Dragon!”

The Snow Dragon exploded, letting out one puff of frosty breath that settled a third icicle onto Buster Blader’s shoulder.  What were the Ice Counters for? Saki thought nervously.

“Finally, I’ll normal summon Cold Enchanter,” Kylie said.  

A slender young boy wrapped in white and blue robes appeared.

“I discard one card so that Cold Enchanter can place another Ice Counter onto a monster,” Kylie said.  “Then I set a card and end my turn.”

Cold Enchanter rose its staff over its head, and a ray of ice beamed out of it, striking Buster Blader in the other knee.  Her poor knight was shivering now, struggling to hold onto its blade. Saki watched with a growing nervousness as Cold Enchanter’s attack rose for each Ice Counter, too, until it was higher attack than Buster Blader.

She shot a look at Haruka.  They were going to get overwhelmed quickly if Haruka didn’t do something about it!!

Haruka drew her card wordlessly, stared at it, and then set three cards on the field.

“Turn end,” she said.

“What??” Saki couldn’t help but blurt.

“Aw, bad hand?” Dinh said sympathetically.   “Well, it’s my turn then!”

Saki’s heart roared.  Was Haruka even going to do anything?  She had such a stony face — was she not going to even try?  Was this her plan? To make Saki lose because she believed in her monsters??

“All right!” Dinh said with a big grin.  “I tribute my Batteryman AA for this! SUper Electromagnetic Voltech Dragon!”

Batteryman AA sparked and then exploded.  In its place, rising up out of the smoke, was the biggest metal dragon Saki had ever seen.  It gnashed its teeth, sending up sparks from inside its massive metal jaw.

“And since AA was used to tribute summon this guy, it gets one thousand extra attack points!” Dinh said proudly.

A big orange battery appeared over the dragon and slotted into a space in its back, making its eyes glow and its attack rise up to thirty four hundred.

“Your field’s looking mighty empty, dear,” Dinh said with a crooked grin at Haruka.  “Voltech Dragon attacks you directly!”

Haruka didn’t even open her eyes.  Saki panicked. If she took this attack  _ and  _ the attack from Batteryman Charger, Haruka would be knocked out of the game!

“I activate my trap card!” Saki shouted.  “Blader Defender!”

Haruka’s eyes flashed open, and she shot shocked look at Saki.  Saki didn’t bother looking back.

“When you declare an attack, I can redirect it to a Buster Blader on my field,” she said.  “And increase my Buster Blader’s attack to the same as yours!”

Buster Blader shot forward, jumping in front of Haruka with its sword held out to catch the lightning attack.  But then, Kylie moved.

“I activate my counter trap!  Cryogenics!” she said, with a vicious smirk.  “When you activate a trap card during the Battle Phase, I can negate and destroy it, and then deal you four hundred points of damage for every Ice Counter on the field!”

A harsh, freezing wind ripped over the field.  Saki screamed as the wind cracked the ice off of Buster Blader and send it in a whirled blizzard of shards down on her, almost cutting into her.  Her life points dropped, and she felt so cold that it was hard to breathe.

Buster Blader stumbled and dropped to one knee.  The lightning bolt from the metal dragon’s mouth streaked over it and struck Haruka instead.

Haruka flinched a bit, but only barely, even as her life points fell to six hundred.  Saki felt her heart rise into her throat.

“Haruka-san, I —” she started.

“I told you,” Haruka said.  “You’re stupid for relying on them.”

Saki bristled, all of her distress at not being able to protect Haruka dissipating.

“We tried!” she practically shouted. “That wasn’t his fault!”

“If you hadn’t had a monster on the field, they wouldn’t have been able to put down Ice Counters!” Haruka snapped.  “That thing couldn’t protect you, and it was the reason you got hurt!”

“That’s not true!”

Haruka actually bared her teeth in a snarl.  She whipped her hand up to her Duel Disk.

“ _ This _ is how I fight,” she said.  “I activate the spell card Inferno Tempest!”

Her spell card flipped up and turned.

Immediately, the icy cold melted away.  Instead, a fiery tempest exploded over the field, making Kylie and Dinh throw their hands over their faces against the glare.

“When I take over three thousand points of damage, I can activate this card,” Haruka said.  “I banish every monster in our decks and graveyards!”

Kylie’s mouth dropped open.  Dinh’s eyes widened. And Saki’s heart almost stopped.   _ All _ of them?

Cards immediately began shooting out of Saki’s deck, and she had to hurry to grab all of them to tuck safely in her deck box.  Kylie and Dinh were similarly occupied for a moment.

Haruka, on the other hand, didn’t move.  She only waited while her fellow duelists tried to pull every monster out of their decks.  Saki felt a strange, cold feeling pass through her. Haruka wasn’t pulling monsters from her deck.

Haruka’s deck didn’t have any monsters.

“You haven’t dealt with the field, though,” Kylie said.  “Dinh, finish her off.”

“Right-o,” Dinh said.  “Batteryman Charger will attack you directly!”

Haruka flung her hand out without a card.

“I activate Mirror Force!  All attack position monsters are destroyed!”

Batteryman Charger’s lightning hit the glass mirror that sprung up in front of Haruka.  The lightning cascaded back down over the field, and Saki screamed. Buster Blader shattered — Voltech, Batteryman Charger, and Cold Enchanter went next.  The field practically smoked, but it was completely and utterly empty now. Saki could only stare at the field in front of her. Her hands shook. Her deck was...all her monsters were...

She was alone.  She didn’t have any monsters in her hand.  She only had spells that would support the monsters that were no longer there or reachable.  It would be her turn next but...but what could she do?

“You’ve made an awful mistake,” Kylie snapped at Haruka.

“Have I?” Haruka said.  She pointed to her final face down card then.  “I activate my last face-down card: D.D. Dynamite.”

The card flipped open, revealing a huge bomb made of a hundred sticks of dynamite.

“When this card goes off, everyone takes three hundred points of damage for each card they have removed from play,” Haruka said.  “Every one of you has at least fifteen monsters removed from play right now.”

_ And Haruka doesn’t _ , Saki thought with a chill.

“Take this,” Haruka said.  “D.D. Dynamite, detonate!”

The bomb exploded.  Saki skidded back from the holographic force, letting out a cry.  Her life points hit zero in an instant.

But then something strange happened — 

Haruka’s life points dropped too.

As the smoke cleared, Saki could see Haruka’s wide, disbelieving gaze.  Before Dinh was a thick glassy pillar. He was the only one with full life points.

“Sorry, dear,” he said.  “I just activated Nature’s Reflection.  If you deal effect damage to me, I deal it to you instead.”

For the first time, Haruka looked horrified.  Her eyes were wide, her hands were shaking. And then her face contorted with anger.  Her jaw clenched.

“Um,” Yuki-sensei said.  “Well, that’s the end of that.  You can...all go back to your seats now.”

Saki couldn’t even look at him.  She felt...she didn’t know how she felt.  Haruka stuffed her hands into her pockets, and stormed towards the other side of the field.  Saki wasn’t sure why she ran after her, but she bolted towards her, vaulting over the side of the field and chasing her into the exit.

“Why?” Saki shouted after her.  “Why are you here at Duel Academia?”

Haruka actually paused.  Her shoulders tensed up.

“To prove it,” she said.

“Prove what??”

“That I don’t need the monsters to be strong!”

Saki felt tears bubble to her eyes — but these were angry, frustrated tears.

“Well,” she gasped.  “You didn’t prove a thing out there.”

She didn’t wait to see if Haruka reacted.  She just turned and stormed back out into the stadium, back to her friends.  If Haruka wanted to be like this...

Then she could be alone with it.


	17. Kaede’s Trial - I’ll Keep Saki’s Secret!

Kaede tried to shove through the crowd, throwing an elbow here or there to nudge her way through. 

“Hey, move it!  Yeah, you heard me!  Get your ass out of the way!  Don’t make me come over there!”

Eventually, even the Obelisk kids seemed to know she meant business, and she managed to shove her way through to the aisle and down the stairs.  Most of Osiris had already left the stadium. Dammit! Where had Saki gone? She’d looked so upset after losing that midterm duel. It wasn’t like it was her fault, though, she did her best.  It wasn’t her fault that her partner was a Grade-A bitch.

“Hey, move!” she shouted at a particularly slow Ra Yellow student who wouldn’t get down the stairs.  “I’m walking here!”

Ugh!  Nobody was paying attention to her urgency!  Kaede ducked under an arm and made it out onto the field.  That Osiris teacher, Yuki Judai, was busy writing things down on his clipboard while he sat on the edge of the raised field.  Kaede quickly ducked out of his way. She still felt embarrassed about last year.

Now where had Saki run off to?  She’d probably bolted after her duel.  Kaede grumbled. That girl was always so emotional.  She quickly scolded that thought, however, blushing. Saki had every right to be emotional, and she wasn’t going to be That Bitch anymore.  She just wanted to make sure she was okay.

Only two or three Osiris kids were left near the opposite entrance.  Kaede didn’t immediately remember their names, but she was pretty sure she knew their faces.  There weren’t many of them after all. She’d ask them if Saki went back to the dorm.

She was halfway across the stadium when someone suddenly planted themselves in front of her.  Kaede wheeled back quickly. Her angry retort died before it left her lips, as she looked up and found Kylie Harbison glaring down at her.

The girl’s lip curled, her arms folded over her chest, looking pristine and regal in that blue uniform.  Immediately, unease settled over Kaede, and she took a step back to put some space between them.

“Hey,” she said.  “You need something?”

Kylie glared at her with those ice cold eyes for a moment.

“You’re friends with that Osiris girl, aren’t you?”

Every alarm bell in Kaede’s head went off.  She threw on a disaffected face, pretending to glance at her cuticles.

“So?  Did I need to apply for a license or something for inter-dorm friendship?”

The deepening scowl on Kylie’s face set Kaede on edge, but she wasn’t about to let that show.  Kylie shifted her weight onto one leg. A cooler, calculating look settled over her sharp features then, considering Kaede.

She leaned in real close, and even Kaede was having trouble pretending to be unaffected.

“Do I have something on my face?” Kaede cracked.

Kylie didn’t respond to the joke.

“What,” she said, “is the deal with Osiris.”

Kaede blinked at her.  Her mouth opened, and for a moment, nothing came out.  What kind of a question was that?

“I mean, they’re Osiris,” she said.  “That’s the deal.”

Kylie scowled, leaning back from Kaede again, arms tightening against her chest.

“Don’t play dumb,” she said.  “Something weird is going on in that dorm.  And you know what it is.”

Uh oh.  Kaede fumbled.  Was this about the superpowers?  This had to be about the superpowers.  But how would Kylie know about that? She couldn’t have just guessed, right?  Kaede hadn’t even guessed, and she’d been friends with Saki since elementary school.  Oh, geez, Saki. Kaede had been so startled by this turn of events that she’d almost forgotten her mission of cheering up Saki after her duel with the Grade-A bitch in front of her.

“I really don’t know what you’re talking about,” Kaede said. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I actually have somewhere to be.”

She tried to duck past Kylie, but Kylie snagged her by the shoulder, holding her in place.

“You can’t protect them for long,” she said in a voice that made Kaede feel cold.  “I’ll find out what’s going on, whether you tell me or not. So you might want to save yourself the trouble and just start talking.”

Kaede hesitated, heart in her throat.  Kylie sounded like she meant business...what the heck had she heard?  Kaede almost blurted something in a panic. But then she felt the gentle bite of the metal medallion against her collarbone, the one that Saki had given her.   _ “It’s a basic protection amulet that Saya made.  Since...since you know about everything that’s going on now, you should definitely have one!  We all have one, just in case.” _

Kaede licked her lips.

“Sorry,” she said.  “But I really don’t know what you’re on about?  It’s just Osiris.”

Kylie considered her for a moment.  Then she released Kaede, and Kaede made a show of brushing off her shoulder as though there were dust on it.  She rolled her eyes, and jogged on.

She hoped that that was enough to hide the face that she had started sweating.

_ I gotta tell Saki about this. _

* * *

Kaede had to run all the way down to the Osiris second-year dorm to find Saki.  Dammit, the run-in with Kylie had let Saki get too far ahead. She was out of breath by the time she reached the dorm, and found Miu sitting on the bottom stair in the entry lobby.  The little girl yawned huge, rubbing at one eye with her sleeved hand.

“Oh,” she said.  “Kacchan.”

“Hey, squirt,” Kaede said.  “Is Saki around?”

Miu grimaced a bit.  She ruffled her hair.

“She’s sulking,” she said.  “Or moping. Miu’s not sure which.”

“In you guys’ room?”

Miu nodded.  Kaede flashed her a peace sign and then turned towards Saki and Miu’s dorm room.  She nodded on the door twice, and waited.

No one answered for a long time.  Kaede tried the handle. It was open, so she let herself in.

“Saki?”

All the lights were off.  Sure enough, there was Saki, lying face down her bed, face buried into her pillow.  Kaede slipped off her shoes and padded inside, sitting down at the foot of the bed. Saki didn’t respond as the bed shifted under her weight.  Kaede waited a few minutes. She tapped out a little tune on her knees.

“So,” she said finally. “How’s it hanging?”

Saki let out a groan, and stuffed her head beneath her pillow.

“This is pretty nostalgic, huh?” Kaede said.  “It’s like sleepovers the day after testing day.  Only, you always passed all of those, and you never needed to worry, even though you did.  You passed this one too, ya know? You did a really good job with the circumstances.”

Saki crunched the pillow over her head.  She mumbled something.

“What was that?” Kaede said, making a show of putting her hand to her ear to lean down.

Saki pulled her head out from under her pillow with a gasp.

“I said, for once the test isn’t what I’m upset about,” she said.

“Oh,” Kaede said.  “Uh. Well. You know what they say about assuming.”

Kaede rubbed the back of her neck, flushing.  Well this was going swimmingly. She and Saki had been reconnecting lately, but Kaede still always felt like she wasn’t...good enough.  Like she’d fucked up too many times already.

Saki shifted her head on her pillow to lay it sideways, staring at nothing.

“I yelled at Matsushita-san,” she said.

“Well, considering how she treated you, she probably deserved it,” Kaede said.

Saki didn’t reject this possibility immediately, which made Kaede take a quick second glance.  She looked so awful. Her eyes were red and puffy from crying, her hair was mussed, and her whole face was ashen.  Kaede fumbled for a moment again. 

She’d spent so many years avoiding the real issues.  Especially with Saki. It was just easier to crack a joke and pretend the serious hint hadn’t actually happened, and never go any deeper.  But that callousness had almost cost her the friendship once. And...and Kaede was still having trouble admitting it to herself, but Saki was too important for her to want to give up.

So she sighed, and flopped sideways down onto the bed next to Saki.  Saki sneezed as Kaede’s hair flopped into her face, scrambling backwards.

“Kaede!  What are you doing?”

“Being obnoxious,” Kaede said.  “It’s what I do best.”

She flipped herself over so that she was facing Saki now.  Saki was as red as her jacket. After a beat, she shot straight up, sitting up right.  Kaede shot her a cross-eyed grin. Then she sat up too, sitting cross legged across from Saki.

“Okay!” she said, putting her hand in the air.  “Let’s open this session of ‘Talking About Our Feelings’!  Today’s special guest is Yamaguchi Saki!”

Saki let out the tiniest giggle in spite of herself.  Success! Kaede grinned and pretended to shove an imaginary microphone at Saki.

“So, Yamaguchi-san,” she said.  “What seems to be the problem today?”

Saki wiped another tear away from her eye, a tiny smile on her lips.

“Thanks, Kaede,” she said.  “It’s just...”

She hesitated, searching for words.  Then she sighed, putting her hands on her ankle.

“You know how I see Duel Spirits, right?” Saki said.

“Yeah,” Kaede said, dropping her imaginary microphone. 

“Matsushita-san does too,” Saki said.  “Only...she really hates them. I don’t know why.  She’s determined not to use monsters in her deck.”

“A monster-less deck?  Whoa,” Kaede said. “Now that’s a strategy.”

Saki’s shoulders crumpled a little.

“She was just so angry,” Saki mumbled. “She kept saying things like...how we were stupid for trusting our monsters.  That they would turn on us or something.”

Kaede hummed.  It was true that she hadn’t known until recently that the monsters were actual real things, and not just a card game...but...still.

“Sorry, that probably sounds silly,” Saki said.  “I just...it kind of hurt, you know? For her to treat the monsters with so much hate.”

“No, I get it,” Kaede said.  She dug in her skirt pocket for her deck box, flicking it open and taking out her cards.  She flicked through them, smiling at her monsters. “You know, we’ve never really talked about this before but...I might not be able to see or hear monsters, but I always kind of thought of them as my friends?”

Saki looked up at her with surprise.  Kaede blushed.

“See, back before I thought that made me sound stupid,” Kaede said. “So I never said it out loud.  But...look.”

She pulled out one of her cards, turning it to Saki.

“See this little guy?” she said, showing her Shaddoll Beast.  “Now don’t laugh, okay? I used to pretend that he was my little friend, and that he slept under my bed to scare the bad monsters away.”

Saki’s eyes lit up.  She looked almost shiny with delight at the admission, and Kaede started blushing.

“Kaede,” Saki said.  “That’s so cute!!”

“Ugh, that’s almost worse than laughing,” Kaede said, flushing deeper.  “But...ugh. Where was I going with this? Oh, yeah, right.”

She turned Shaddoll Beast back to face her.  It wasn’t cute by normal standards, but she’d always loved it.  It looked like a cross between a dog, a dragon, and a saber toothed tiger, with a thick purple man and big fangs, hanging on the card by little strings.

“Shaddoll Beast was my imaginary friend back then,” she said.  “He inspired me, and gave me courage, like a real life friend would.  And...you know, friends are hard.”

She fumbled again.

“Words are hard too,” she groaned.  “What I’m saying is — maybe I never had a problem with Shaddoll Beast because our friendship was always all in my head, but for you and Matsushita, it’s never been in your head.  You’ve been able to see them from the beginning, to interact with them. And when you can interact with people...I dunno. Sometimes you make mistakes.”

She blushed again, looking down at the bed.

“I mean,” she said.  “I’m sure there was a time where you didn’t want to talk to me ever again, right?”

“Kaede,” Saki said, but Kaede kept talking.

“So maybe that’s all that’s up.  Maybe that’s where Matsushita’s at.  Friendships are weird, ya know? Just...don’t take it personally.  Sounds like she’s got a bunch of her own baggage to deal with.”

She chanced a quick glance at Saki.  It sort of stressed her out to see Saki looking at her with such care.  Like, ugh, she hadn’t meant to make this about her, but suddenly Saki was worrying about her or something. 

“That was really...well thought out, Kaede,” Saki said.  “Thank you...that helped.”

Kaede smiled then, sighing with relief.  Thank god. She’d gotten it across. She rocked back and forth for a moment, just sitting in the awkward silence.

“Oh,” she said, her smile slipping.  “Not to ruin the feel-good mood we’ve got going on here...but I’ve got something to tell you about Kylie.”

Saki looked downcast immediately at the sound of Kylie’s name, and Kaede felt like shit for bringing it up.  But this could be more dangerous to leave unsaid.

“She stopped me on my way out,” Kaede said.  “Tried to ask me weird questions about Osiris.  Like...she has suspicions, maybe?”

“Suspicions?  About Osiris?” 

“Yeah, it was weird.  She wanted me to tell her Osiris’s secret, and I told her there wasn’t any,” Kaede said.  “But honestly, watch out for her. She’s...a bitch, and that’s putting it lightly.”

“She didn’t...harass you, did she?” Saki said, leaning forward with a nervous look.

“I harassed her more than she did me,” Kaede joked.  “Don’t worry, Saki. I can handle myself.”

“But if she tries to get to you because of us...”

Kaede chopped her lightly on the forehead.

“Dummy,” she said.  “I didn’t tell you about this because I wanted to make you worry about  _ me _ .  Think about yourself for once, will you?”

“I did that,” Saki said quietly.  “And we almost weren’t friends afterward.”

Kaede felt a sickness twist over her for a moment.  Then she chopped Saki on the forehead again, a little harder this time.

“No,” she said.  “ _ I _ almost didn’t stay friends with you.  Don’t you act like that was your fault.”

She slid her legs around back onto the carpet, sitting on the edge of the bed.  She tapped her fingers against the comforter.

“Seriously,” Kaede said quietly.  “We’re cool, right?”

She chanced a nervous look over her shoulder.  She was relieved to see Saki giving her a tiny smile.

“We’re cool,” she said.  “But only if you don’t tell me to stop worrying about you.”

“Ugh, okay mom,” Kaede said.  “You want me to get you anything?”

“I’m okay...”

“Okay.  Juice it is.”

“Kaede...”

Kaede just shot her a wink, and leaped over to the door before Saki could protest anymore.  She needed a minute to take a breather from the heavy atmosphere in there, and making a juice run would help.  She slapped her cheeks a few times in the hallway. Okay, Kaede! She’d grab some juice, and then head back and she and Saki would watch some stupid internet videos until they’d both laughed enough to stop feeling so mopey anymore.

The snack shop luckily wasn’t too far from Osiris, probably since they were the farthest away from the school and the other dorms had their own vending machines.  Kaede let herself inside and went straight for the vending machine. There were a couple students already in there, looking through the candy jars, one of them petting the cat that always seemed to be in here.  Kaede dug in her pocket for some money and selected some juice.

“Oh, hey, Kaede-san.”

Kaede looked back from the vending machine.

“Oh, Fumino-chan,” she said.  “What’s up?”

Her roommate flashed her a half smile.  Fumino was taller than Kaede, built like a tennis player with toned arms and calves.  Her pixie cut black hair was pushed back from her eyes with a pair of painted bobby pins, and she’d already taken the first chance she had to change out of her uniform, in a pair of athletic shorts and a tank top with her yellow jacket tied around her waist.

“Just grabbing a protein bar on my run,” Fumino said, holding up the bar.  She swiped her meal card on the nearby reader and scanned the bar onto it. “You?”

“Getting some juice,” Kaede said.  

Her purchase clattered out of the vending machine then, and she pulled out the pair of cans.

“Where are you headed off to?”

“Back to Osiris dorm.  Saki needs some cheering up after her duel.”

Fumino considered her for a minute.

“What?” Kaede said.

“I dunno, it’s just, you spend a lot of time at Osiris, ya know?” she said.  “I hardly ever see you around in the dorm.”

“I’m just hanging out with my friends?” Kaede said, frowning.  “Is there something wrong with that?”

“No, of course not,” Fumino said quickly.  “But like...I mean. They’re Osiris, right?  Don’t you want to hang out with...your own team, you know?”

Kaede stared at her.  For a moment, she couldn’t even come up with a retort.  She and Fumino weren’t the best friends in the world, but she’d always been a pleasant sort.  This was the first she’d ever heard Fumino say something like that.

“My ‘team’?” Kaede finally said.  “Last time I checked, we’re not playing basketball or some shit. We all go to the same school.”

“That’s not what I meant,” Fumino said quickly.

“Oh really?  What did you mean then?” Kaede said, irritation spiking in her head.  “What, are we in some kind of competition or something? There’s not enough card games to go around so we have to fight each other for them?  What did you  _ mean _ ?”

“You don’t have to shout,” Fumino said, looking a little irritated now.  “You’re making a scene.”

Kaede hadn’t been shouting, but she felt like doing so now.  She shot a glare to the other students in the snack shop, who were all shooting furtive glances at the pair of them.

“This is ridiculous,” Kaede said.  “Whatever happened to school spirit!”

The juice cans in her hands were biting at her palms with their coldness, and she stormed past Fumino towards the door.  Fumino followed after her at a jog.

“Kaede-san, come on,” Fumino said.  “Listen — hey! Just, can’t we talk about this?”

“We were, and it wasn’t going anywhere,” Kaede said. 

“Kaede-san, come on.”

Kaede whirled on her heels, making Fumino stumble to a stop before she ran into her.  Kaede didn’t know why she felt so upset — well, she knew, but she wasn’t sure why she was  _ this _ upset.  Maybe it was because of Kylie’s weird questions, and Saki’s moping, and Haruka’s bitchiness, and now Fumino’s passive-aggressiveness all piling up on each other.

“What do you want me to say?” she said.  “You want me to laugh and say ‘haha yeah, I also think that Osiris is full of stupid people’?”

“Hey, don’t put words in my mouth,” Fumino said crossly.  “I wasn’t trying to say  _ that _ .”

“Okay, well explain it then!  I don’t know how else to interpret that!”

Fumino rubbed the back of her neck, looking flushed.  Kaede couldn’t tell if it was from irritation or embarrassment or something else.

“They just — they keep to themselves, you know??” Fumino said.  “It’s not like they make an effort to be friends with anyone outside their dorm!”

“Well maybe if people would stop treating them like less than human for the crime of having  _ bad grades _ they’d feel better about interacting with other dorms!”

“Maybe if they worked harder, they wouldn’t  _ be  _ in Osiris!”

Kaede felt like she was one of her cans of juice, shaken up and ready to explode.

“And what’s wrong with Osiris?” she shouted.  “What’s wrong with it??”

“This school runs on merit, you know!” Fumino shouted back. “Its prestige will drop if there’s too many low-achieving students!”

“Oh, so now this is about you?  This is about making you look better for what you’ve got on your resume?   _ Christ _ , Fumino!”

“Stop putting words into my mouth!”

“Well then stop saying things that are so easy to fucking misinterpret!”

Fumino looked like she was on the verge of tears, now, and Kaede couldn’t even bring herself to feel bad about it.  She wanted to throw one of the juice cans into Fumino’s face. Why was she so dizzy?? She felt so mad that she was going to pass out!

“I was trying to think of you,” Fumino said through grit teeth.  “You don’t know what people are saying about you, Kaede-san. You’re going to get caught up in trouble at this rate.”

“And I. Don’t. Care.”

She was so mad that she was shaking.  Angry tears started bubbling to her eyes, but she was holding two cans of juice and she couldn’t wipe them away.  She was going to start shouting again when a large, gentle hand rested on her shoulder.

“We having some trouble, ladies?”

Kaede looked up, blinking her tears away to see.

“T-Tania-sensei,” she said, flushing.

Her dorm advisor flashed her, and then Fumino, her usual toothy grin.  She wasn’t the only teacher walking by, either. Kaede glanced around her to see Johan Andersen standing just a foot away, clearly having been walking with her before Tania came over to break up their fight.  Fumino looked quickly away.

“Is anything wrong?” Andersen-sensei asked, sounding legitimately concerned.

“No,” Fumino said.  “Nothing.”

She sent Kaede a very confusing glance, a mixture of frustration, anger, and pity.  Kaede would have flipped her off if she wasn’t holding two cans of juice. Then Fumino was walking away, leaving Kaede along with Tania looming over her.

Tania squeezed her shoulder lightly — though for Tania, lightly meant  _ ouch I think you just dislocated my shoulder _ .  Kaede yelped, and Tania quickly let go.

“Sorry, kid,” she said, flashing her another smile.  “Don’t know my own strength. You holding up?”

Now that Fumino was there yelling, Kaede felt the dam in her eyes about to break.  She kept trembling — but no way was she going to start crying in front of her teachers.

“It sounds like you were having a rough time,” Andersen-sensei said gently. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” Kaede mumbled.

It occurred to her then that Saki had told her Tania was actually a Duel Spirit, and Kaede hadn’t had a chance to ask or confirm it all semester.  She eyed her dorm advisor with some curiosity.

“Does it bother you?” she ended up blurting out.

“Does what bother me?” Tania asked.

Kaede blushed.  She tried to think of how to phrase it, flicking her eyes back and forth between Tania and Andersen.

“The way people talk about it,” Kaede said.  “Osiris, I mean. I mean, you guys know the truth, that they’re all magic and shit and that’s a place for them to be safe, but everyone else treats them all badly because they think they’re there for bad grades.”

Andersen sighed.

“It’s a difficult balance to walk,” he said.  “We don’t know that it would be any easier if people knew the truth.  In fact, it might make things more tense.”

Kaede looked down at the ground.  She’d often thought about that. If they knew the truth about Osiris...wouldn’t people just fear them, or think of them as freaks?  People could be real stupid like that.

“Would it be any better if Osiris really was a dorm for low-achievers?” Tania said.

“No!  That wouldn’t be better either,” Kaede said.  “I just...ugh. I...I don’t know.”

Tears were filling her eyes again.  Oh, geez, she really was going to cry in front of her teachers.

“It’s just not fair,” she said.  “None of us have been fair to anyone.”

“Hisakawa-san, it isn’t your fault,” Andersen said softly.

“It is, though!” she blurted.  Oh, geez, she must really be upset if she was starting to dump on her  _ teachers _ .  “Because — because I was the same way until I found out the truth, and how fucked up is that?  I treated my friend like shit because I thought she had low grades? I...”

Her shoulders clenched up over her ears, and she started crying for real now.  Her tears rolled from her chin to the dirt. It was stupid to talk about this to a teacher but she couldn’t stop herself now.

“The truth was, when Saki ended up in Osiris, I was relieved!  That’s so fucked up, right? She’s always been smarter and better than me at everything!  And when I was in Ra and she wasn’t, I felt like — finally, I’d done something better than her.  But that’s not even true, is it? Osiris is different now, and if things hadn’t been like this,  _ I _ would have been the one in Osiris. I would have been the one everyone was screwing with and looking down on.  But Saki...Saki never would have...she’s...”

She had to drop down into a crouch, curling up over her knees, barely clinging to the cans as she shook and cried.

“I’m so fucked up,” she said.  “I act like I’m so much better than the others for not being mean to Osiris, because I know the truth.  But that’s just what a decent fucking person should do even without knowing that . That’s what Saki would have done.  And I’m just not that good.”

She didn’t see Andersen kneel down next to her, but she heard him sigh as he crouched down near her.

“Hey,” he said softly.  “Hisakawa-san?”

Kaede peeked over her knees to see Andersen crouching in front of her, his arms resting on top of his knees.  He smiled at her, eyes softening.

“What is it that you want from yourself, right now?” he said.

Kaede’s lips parted.  She looked down at her knees.  The question had thrown her off guard.  She opened her mouth and closed it a few times.

“I just...I want to be friends with Saki,” she said.  “And with all of them. For real. Not the fake stuff before.  I want to be real friends.”

Andersen’s smiled deepened.

“Then I think you’re doing just fine,” he said.

Kaede’s shoulders trembled.  She had to put the juice down on the ground.  She she hugged her knees, pressed her face against her legs, and cried.

* * *

There was another letter on her desk.  Kylie hesitated in the middle of putting her bag down.  She glanced behind her. There had been no sign of her door having been opened.  She didn’t have a roommate. And she only had the one key. She glanced at the window, but it hadn’t been opened.

And yet, there the letter sat.  Staring at her. She pursed her lips.

Then she stepped forward, picked it up, and slit it open.  What would this one say? Another useless tip for her to bully Hisakawa Kaede into telling her the truth about Osiris Red?

She opened the envelope.  She pulled the paper out and unfolded it.

Her eyes fell on a drawing.  What was this? A floor plan?  The construction looked familiar.

There was a mark on the bottom floor of the plan.  Just a small red circle, indicating a spot on the lower floor.  She pressed her lips together, squinting. Where did she recognize this building shape from?

Ah, she thought, a faint smile crossing her lips.  That was right.

This was a map of the abandoned dorm.


	18. This is War!! - Obelisk vs Osiris

Keeping on her colors all day was hard.  Anani had started wearing hats, hoodies, and long-sleeves to class, so that she could at least leave her hair white without anyone noticing, and only have to focus on her face and hands.  Hats and hoodies weren’t in the dress code, of course, but all of the teachers knew about Osiris, and Yuki-sensei had passed on that she had special permission to wear them, so she didn’t have to worry about being called out.  Chronos-sensei had simply glanced at her, eyes sparked with recognition, and given her a perfunctory nod before continuing the lesson. It was a relief, really. Trying to focus on her colors made it harder to focus in class.

She was busy scribbling down history notes and thinking about the color in her face and hands, so focused that she didn’t notice someone leaning in front behind her until their hand knotted into her hat and yanked it off.

“That’s against dress code, drop-out,” someone hissed behind her, as her braid fell out of the hat and smacked against her back.  She was so surprised that for a moment, the color all drained out of her face and hands. It took all of her focus _not_ to suddenly flood her hair with color — whoever was behind her would definitely see that!!

She heard the boy behind her let out a surprised chuckle.

“Whoa, got yourself a bad dye job?  That’s against school rules too, you know!”

Anani shook the color back into her face and hands before she turned in her seat.  There was an Obelisk boy sitting behind her. When had he gotten there? She thought there was a Ra behind her.  He grinned at her, swinging her hat back and forth.

“Please give me my hat back,” she said quietly.

“You’re not supposed to have it,” the boy said, sprawling his chest over the desk.  “I’m doing you a favor.”

Maintaining color was getting hard; her skin was starting to turn gray under her shirt from the stress.

“Please give it back,” she said.  “It belongs to a friend of mine. I need it back.”

“Gorgonzola, what is going on back there, na no ne??”

Chronos’s voice cut across the room, and Anani almost turned a bright red.  She kept it in her chest as every eye in the classroom turned towards her. Minato shot her a concerned look.  She felt sick — that was their hat she was borrowing, and the boy wasn’t giving it back.

The boy stood up, holding the hat over his head.

“She’s wearing a hat in class, professor,” he said.  “And she’s gotten her hair dyed.”

Anani’s cheeks went pink now — everyone was looking at her!  She pressed her hands into her lap and tried not to cry.

Chronos looked suddenly very startled.  His mouth opened once or twice — clearly, the gears were turning in his head.  He knew why Anani’s hair was white, and why she was wearing the hat. But he obviously couldn’t say it in front of the whole class without spilling the secret.  But if he didn’t say something, he’d have no excuse for not calling Anani out on both her hat and her hair.

After a moment’s more fumbling, Chronos went red in the cheeks, pointing at the boy.

“You will not harass other students in my class, na no ne,” he said.  “Ivanova-san has prior permission for her hat.”

“What the hell for?” the boy said incredulously.

“Other’s medical conditions are not your concern!” Chronos said.  “Now return the hat to Ivanova-san, and return to your seat, or I shall be forced to give you detention!”

The boy scowled at Anani.

“Why do you dropouts get all the special treatment?” he growled, tossing the hat back to her.

She jammed it back onto her head, sticking her braid back up inside it.  Keeping the embarrassed pink and stressed gray out of her face was so hard — and everyone was still shooting her looks!  Chronos had certainly done the best he could, but now they all thought she had a medical condition that forced her to wear a hat?  What did that even mean?

Anani fought back tears, and returned to her work.  She’d just have to...keep trying her best. Like she always had to.

* * *

"Okay, let’s do it again," Kayoko signed to Lin.   "Do you need me to move the light?"

"No, it’s fine ," Lin signed back.

Kayoko tapped the desk lamp back on that she’d plugged into a nearby outlet.  It flickered on, shining through the gem dice that were sitting on the big window seat.  Lin picked them up, rolled them in their fingers, and tossed them. Kayoko watched the movement of their fingers, caught the flicker of the lines on their palms.  They scattered across the window sill, and Kayoko watched Lin’s eyes squint at them, the light passing through the deep gem-like depths.

"Anything? "Kayoko signed.

Lin rubbed their chin.  Then their eyes flickered up, lips parted.  Kayoko was surprised at the dark look that crossed their eyes.

"What’s wrong?"she signed.

"Nothing," Lin signed.  "Don’t worry about it."

But they’d definitely looked at something behind Kayoko.  She turned in her seat to look over the lobby.

Oh, she thought, stomach turning with a mixture of anger and embarrassment.  There were a group of Obelisk kids standing behind her. They were flapping their hands wildly at each other in a poor imitation of sign language.  She could see their lips moving and was pretty sure they were making fun of her. She was too far away and they weren’t facing her enough for her to read their lips at all.

“Hey,” she said.  “Go find something else to do.”

She watched them all start laughing.  One of them started shouting at the others with a funny face, and Kayoko felt an angry heat pass through her chest.  They were making fun of the way she talked, she was sure of it.

Lin put their hand on her shoulder, and she turned to look at them.  They tried signing, but then seemed to fumble with the words they wanted to use, so they just mouthed it at her as clearly as possible.

_They’re assholes.  Ignore them._

Ignore them.  That’s what everyone always said.  It never worked.

Still, she didn’t want to cause a scene.  There were some other Obelisks in the lounge too, and some Ra students.  A few of them looked at the laughing Obelisks with some distaste, but didn’t do anything to stop them.  A couple others were laughing too, but most of them seemed to be trying their best to ignore what was going on, faces buried in their homework or their phones.  Kayoko stared down at her hands.

"Let’s keep working," Lin signed at her.

She nodded, even though all she wanted to do was to run back to the dorm and hide there instead.  She watched Lin pick up the dice again.

Lin’s eyes moved up, though, and Kayoko jumped at the movement in her peripherals.  The Obelisks were surrounding them now, pinning them in to the window seat where they were sitting. One of them said something to Lin that Kayoko didn’t catch.  Lin spoke back, and Kayoko read their lips mostly this time, catching a word here or there about _allowed to...as much as anyone else._

One of them turned to Kayoko and leaned down on their hands and knees like she was a child.  She bristled. They yelled something at her, which she couldn’t hear, and only managed to get some of the words from reading the lips.  Something about _slacker_ and _study before you play_.

“Don’t yell,” she said.  “Just talk clearly.”

Something about their face when they spoke next made her think that they were making fun of the way she talked again.  She bristled.

Lin tried to stand up quickly, to make them all stand back.  One of them kicked their crutches over from where they’d been leaning against the wall.  Lin said something again and Kayoko could see them all laughing. Lin stumbled a little trying to reach for their crutches and had to sit back down again.

She was about to start crying, she could sense it.  This was so unfair! What had they ever done to them??

All of the Obelisk students suddenly stood straight up, all of them looking back behind them.  It was quickly clear what had drawn their attention as Headmistress Tenjoin stalked over to them, looking like she was about to blow a gasket.  Kayoko didn’t catch a single word of what she laid down on them, and then she was tapping out something onto her pager that sent to the Obelisks students.  She pointed, and they all slunk away.

She turned to the Kayoko and Lin, then.  She picked up Lin’s crutches and handed them over.

“Are you all right?” Kayoko saw her say.

“We’re fine,” she saw Lin’s lips say.  “We’ll just go back to the dorm.”

Frustrated tears bubbled in Kayoko’s eyes.  This was so unfair. They had just as much right to be here as anyone else!  But only a teacher had come to help them — the others had just sat there.

Not fair, she thought. Not fair at all.

* * *

Eun let out a whoop of approval as Taro performed a perfect handstand.  Ji-U applauded.

“I’ve been practicing all week!!” he said, grinning.

“Heck yeah, man,” she said.  “Okay, okay, my turn.”

Taro flipped back down, dusting himself off.  He took off his jacket and dumped it into the grass beside their pile of books and notebooks they’d left while they were practicing.  Eun pretended to roll up her sleeves. She started forwards, rolling onto her hands, and flipping her legs up. Taro caught her by the ankles to help her stand.

“Think you can hold it?” he said.

“Yeah, let me try!”

He let go, and Eun compensated her weight against her hands.  It burned her wrists, and she was starting to get a little light-headed, but she was holding it!  Heck yeah!

She startled, though, when she heard Ji-U let out an involuntary, dragon-like hiss of anger, and Taro growled.  She quickly flipped back down onto her feet, shaking off the dizziness.

“What’s the big idea!!” Taro yelled.  His ears and tail weren’t out right now, but she could see his hackles raising.  It took her a moment to clear her head enough to see what they were angry at.

Two Obelisk girls were standing over their books — and Eun’s eyes bulged as she noticed that they’d just dumped a whole cup of coffee over them.

“Oh,” the girl said.  “I’m so sorry. I didn’t see that there.”

“Like hell you didn’t!” Ji-U snarled.

“Well, hey,” said the other girl.  “If you have time to play around like this, you have time to re-do all this homework, right?”

“It’s not like it’ll make a difference, anyway.  You two have been in Osiris since you got here, after all.  Your dad must be so disappointed,” the first girl said. “That is, if your dad has time to be disappointed what with all his scandals.  What’s that rumor again? That he’s got two wives? No wonder you guys are fucked up.”

Eun shot to her feet, blood roaring with anger.  She could feel the air starting to snap and crackle from the static that she and Ji-U were starting to produce.

“You leave our family out of this,” she snarled.

“Or what?  You’re gonna sic your daddy on us?  I guess that’s all you can do, since you can’t be good students!”

Taro growled again, and the girls snickered at him.  His face was red and flushed, and he looked equal parts angry and embarrassed.  Eun put her fists up — she was ready to punch a bitch if she had to.

“Piss off!” Ji-U said.

“What are you going to do if we don’t?” one of them sneered.

Ji-U punched her in the face.

She went down like a stone, eyes wide with shock.  The other girl screamed. She made a swing at Ji-U, but Ji-U was not only faster and stronger from her dragon heritage, but their dad had gotten her and Eun enrolled in judo since they were kids.  Ji-U ducked under the swing, and socked the girl in the jaw.

“What is going on here??”

Ji-U stopped in the middle of throwing another punch — or rather, Taro grabbed her arm and held her back, looking nervously at the teacher who’d just walked up.

Misawa Daichi looked between all of them, as the Obelisk girl on the ground scrambled to her feet.  The girl started crying immediately, as though she’d just been waiting to flip the switch.

“Sensei, they just started attacking us for no reason!” she said.

“That’s not true!” Eun said.  “They dumped coffee on our stuff!”

“They were saying mean things about Ji-U-senpai and Eun-senpai’s family,” Taro said.

The girl kept crying, and Misawa’s jaw set.  He folded his arms, appearing to consider the situation for a moment.

“Take your friend to the nurse’s office,” he finally said to the Obelisk girls. “We’ll see about what to do about this.”

“Sensei!” Eun protested, but Misawa silenced her with a soft look.

The Obelisk girl shot a glare at them as she helped her still crying friend away.  They waited in a tense silence until they were out of earshot.

“Sensei, it’s true, they provoked us,” Eun said quickly.  “We —”

“I’m not going to be giving out any punishment for this,” Misawa said, clearly trying to be reassuring.

“Not even to them??”

“Ishtar Kaiba-san, I —”

“They’re getting worse!” Ji-U said, her eyes flashing — literally flashing, too; her dragon half was starting to make her eyes and her skin glow a bit from anger.  “This is our third year, and they’ve never been this bad before, Misawa-sensei! Something’s going on!”

“They’ve always been bitches in Obelisk, but it’s never gotten this bad,” Eun agreed.  “We wouldn’t just attack them for no reason, sensei, honest.”

“And I know that,” Misawa said.  “Unfortunately, I’m in a very difficult position as a teacher, and especially as a teacher with a class like yours involved.  There’s...a delicate balance here that needs to be struck.”

He sighed, stroking his beard for a moment.

“If you take your things to Judai, he’ll be able to restore them,” he said, nodding to the soaked books and homework.  “As for Obelisk’s actions...as much as I understand, I can’t condone fist fighting. You understand that, right?”

“They started it,” Eun grumbled.

“I know,” Misawa said with another heavy sigh.  “But figuring out how to get them to _stop_ is another matter.”

* * *

“All right, all right!  Everyone calm down, I’m calling this meeting to order.”

Minato rapped their fist against the table a few times, and slowly, everyone’s chatter died down.  Now all eyes were on them, and they fumbled for a moment. Thankfully, their Jian took over, standing up from beside them and glancing over the room.

“Is this everybody?” she asked.  

“Haru-chan didn’t come out of her room,” Keiko said.

“Typical,” Minato grumbled.

Jian sighed, and shook her head.

“Well, I doubt we’ll get her to come anyway.  So...regardless of that, I think you all know why we’re here, right?”

“Because Obelisk and Ra are a bunch of dicks,” called Ji-U.

“Couldn’t have said it better myself,” Jian said, nodding.  “So here’s our problem. Obelisk especially has gotten _real bad_ this year since we got back from break.  They’ve always been bullies but like...”

She trailed off, shaking her head.

“This feels almost premeditated,” Ren picked up, steepling his fingers.  “It’s like they’re organized about laying pressure on us.”

“I’ll bet it’s Kylie!” Nina piped up.  “Everyone’s been saying she’s top dog in Obelisk right now!”

“Def Kylie,” Kaede said, nodding.  She was perched on the seat next to Saki; for the past few weeks she’d been sleeping over in Saki’s room since it seemed she’d had a falling out with her roommate before break.  “She’s the ringleader up there, and she’s gotten real nasty. Even Ra was talking about it while I was there.”

“Kaede-san, do you have any other information you might know about why it’s gotten like this all of a sudden?” Jian asked.

Kaede frowned, rubbing her neck.

“Mostly I just know Kylie’s been complaining about ‘special treatment’ for Osiris,” she said.  “I think they’re mad about Saki and Saya-senpai being the graduation duel last year. Up until then, it had always been Obelisk students who do that — I think Kylie thought she was going to be the first-year representative.”

“So we know that they’re mad because we showed them up, then,” Ren said with a sigh. “What sore losers.”

“We oughta fight back!” Mi-Gyeong shouted, throwing her hand up into the air.

“That’s what this meeting is for, right?  An attack plan?” Nina said. She bounced in her seat excitedly.

Kayoko tapped Hanako next to them and signed something.  Hanako, who’d been translating for Kayoko by typing out what everyone was saying on her laptop between them, nodded, and turned towards the front again.

“Kayoko would like to know what kind of ‘attack plan’ we’d be going for,” she said.  “Are we going to be bullying them back?”

Hanako and Kayoko _both_ looked uncomfortable with that idea, but Ji-U slammed her fist on the table.

“It’s only what they deserve!” she said.  “They have it coming!”

“We’re way stronger than they are,” Lindbloom pointed out.  “It would be super easy to push back.”

“D-do you mean using our powers on people?” Takako asked, eyes widening.

“That seems a bit much,” Minato said.

“A bit much,” Reina echoed, nodding quickly.

“We don’t have to be deadly or blatant about it!” Nina said.  “We can just send spirit partners into their dorms to like, steal their shampoo or something!”

Keiko grinned and kicked her legs back and forth.

“I’ve got some ideas,” she said, raising her hand.

“Miu’s sure you do,” Miu grumbled.

Diana frowned, resting her hands on the table in front of her for a moment before raising her hand.  She waited patiently until Jian finally nodded at her.

“Wouldn’t retaliation just make them come back at us with even more vitriol?” she said, sounding concerned.  “I don’t mean to say we should simply be passive, but...fighting fire with fire only burns the whole forest down.”

“Translate that for dummies like me, please!” Nina said.

“Diana thinks they’ll get nastier if we try to fight back,” Harue said.

“Oh.  Well, yeah, that can happen.”

A brief silence fell over the room, as everyone thought about it.  Toitoi raised her hand then.

“Um, I still think not doing anything or trying to ignore them won’t help,” she said.  “I mean, bullies like it when people don’t do anything about it. We might not want to get mean about fighting back, but we’ve gotta show ‘em we won’t take it.”

“How do we do that, though?” Ji-U said.

“If they’re organized, we should be too,” Mylene said.  “We can organize going places in groups so that they can’t get us by ourselves, and yea, maybe play a prank or two back at them.”

Xe glanced at the looks xe was getting and shrugged.

“Hey, I’m not about to roll over, you know,” xe said.

“I don’t think anyone’s saying that we should,” Minato said.  “But I do get what you’re saying. We should definitely make sure we’re going places in groups to make it harder for them to gang up.”

“Osiris always takes care of each other,” said Mostyn softly.  Anani nodded, leaning against his shoulder.

There was another brief silence.  And then another hand rose up. Minato looked over to see Saki sitting there with her hand in the air.  She’d been remarkably quiet today, and in fact, for a while. Seeing her raise her hand made Minato feel a little better.  She was finally engaging again.

“Yeah, Saki?  What do you have to add?” Jian asked.

Saki actually stood up, slowly.  She still looked a little pale. Kaede and Miu both shot her worried looks from either side of her.

“I...” she started.  She cleared her throat and shook her head.  “First...I feel like I almost need to apologize.  If I hadn’t been the student representative last year...”

There was an immediate clamor of protests from all around the room, mostly from the second- and third-years, but even some of the first-years. Saki blushed.

“It’s not your fault,” Minato said firmly.  “You didn’t make them take it badly. You just did your best, like always.”

“Yeah, they’re the assholes!” said Eun.

Akiara nodded wildly beside her.  Saki blushed deeply, ducking her head behind her bangs.

“Okay, okay,” she said.  “I won’t say that. But...”

She licked her lips.

“As much as I think we need to fight back, and take care of each other...I think that’s not going to fix it.”

She frowned, thinking about her next words.  The whole room was silent and waiting for her to speak.

“Like...of course we take care of each other.  Osiris always has since I’ve come here,” she said. “But that’s part of the problem.  We’ve been isolated from the rest of the school, one way or another, for better or worse.  And of course that’s kind of going to happen, because of the kind of class we are but...”

She inhaled.

“I think if we’re going to fix this, we need to start making allies outside of Osiris.”

She looked down at Kaede, who blushed a little and started playing with her hair.

“Those loud groups in Obelisk are going to keep doing this as long as they think they can get away with it,” Saki said.  “And even if we fight back, we’re the group they’ve marked. We can yell and throw our hands around as much as they want, and they’ll just laugh.  What we need is to help other people stand up against them.”

She nodded at Kaede, who sat up, still pink in the cheeks.

“I mean, Obelisk kids bully people in Ra, too,” she said.  “I’ve seen it happen and like...no one does anything. Not even me...”

She looked really downcast at that, and Miu reached behind Saki to pat her on the shoulder.  Saki nodded, looking determined.

“We definitely need to work together against Obelisk,” she said.  “But we need to show them that we’re not the only ones standing up to them, and show everyone else who’s been harassed that it’s not impossible to!”

The room went quiet in the echo of her words.  Slowly, a blush crept over her cheeks. She opened her mouth again, probably to keep rambling.

Minato clapped.  After a few beats, others in the room copied them.  A faint rain of applause echoed around the room. Saki went bright pink and quickly sat down in her seat.

“Saki makes a really great point,” Jian said with a smile.  “You know, it’s true. I haven’t really made any friends outside of Osiris...never really given them much of a chance.”

She rubbed beneath her nose with one finger.

“I think that’s a great plan,” she said.

“It’s like a spy movie! The more people we win to our side, the more we pull the supports out from under Obelisk!” Nina said.  “Operation Make Friends, go!”

“I still wanna get back at Obelisk,” Ji-U said with a frown.

“I’m sure we can do both,” Mylene said, grinning.

Jian rapped her knuckles on the table.

“All right, team,” she said, grinning widely with determination. “Meeting adjourned!”


	19. Counterattack! - Osiris vs. Obelisk, Pt 2

“I told you, I don’t want to...leave me alone.”

Miu looked up from her homework.  Across the lounge, on one of the couches pushed up to the back wall, a very flushed looking Ra girl was sitting at the very end with her laptop on her knees.  An Obelisk boy sat very close to her, close enough to press their thighs up against each other. The girl was looking very nervous. Miu’s eyes narrowed.

Miu exchanged a glance with Ren, who was sitting beside her.  His eyes had gone pretty flinty. Miu grabbed his arm before he could stand up, though.  The room was full of other Ra students and a couple other Obelisks, and no one else was doing anything.  If they were going to do something...she didn’t want to make the girl feel worse if everyone stared. They needed a plan.

She hummed, flicking her eyes around the room.  Then something occurred to her. She quickly wrote something down on a piece of paper and slid it to Ren.  Ren glanced at it. A mischievous grin split his face, and he nodded.

Miu stood up then, moving quietly as a cat across the room until she was standing in front of the Ra and the Obelisk.  The girl’s eyes flicked up to Miu first, and it was hard to tell what she was thinking. The Obelisk boy glowered at her.,

“What, dropout?” he said.  “You got a problem?”

Miu wasn’t very good at confrontation.  She couldn’t throw a punch like the twins, or deliver dumb burns like Nina, or scowl like Minato.  What she was very good at, however, was staring.

So she stared.  She stared directly at the Obelisk boy, right into his eyes, not blinking or moving.  It didn’t take long for him to grow visibly uncomfortable, his face getting a little pale as he squirmed a bit in his seat.

“What’s your fucking deal?” he said, rising up out of his seat and looming over her.  

She didn’t let herself flinch.  She just continued to stare. She tilted her head very slightly, like a doll.  He looked actually a little panicked now. For a moment, he started to reach for her.

Then she pointed down.

“You should fix that,” she said quietly.

His eyes flicked down immediately, thrown off guard by the sudden change in pace.   His eyes bulged at the sight of his undone fly. Immediately, his hands flew down to it, fixing it as he fled.  The nearest couple of Ra students, who had been watching, started muffling snickers and giggles.

The Ra girl on the couch let out a huge breath.

“Uh,” she said, glancing nervously at Miu.  “Thanks?”

Miu nodded.  Ren wandered over then next to her, nodding at the girl.  He shared a behind the back fist bump with Miu. It had been pretty good, that animation spell that had undone his zipper — he was so focused on Miu he hadn’t even noticed it unzipping.

“I like the stickers on your laptop,” Ren said.  “Where did you get them?”

The girl blinked.  For a moment, her lips parted.  Then she smiled, a little tentatively.

“My friend made them,” she said shyly.

“Wow, cool,” Ren said.  “Hey, do you mind if I sit at the table over here?”

“G-go ahead.”

Ren took a seat at the table next to the couch, and Miu gathered up her things and spread out on the other side of the couch, not enough to crowd her, but enough to prevent anyone else from trying to sit down next to her like that.

The girl didn’t bring any attention to it.  But Miu could see her smiling a little as she got back to work.

* * *

Keiko was used to bullies.  Most of her brothers could be the most obnoxious, rude, awful people.  They liked to toss her around or steal her Halloween candy, or make fun of her when she cried.

That’s why Keiko was the _perfect_ warrior for the war against Obelisk, she thought with a prim smile.  She knew this game better than anyone. Getting people on the fence to want to help Osiris?  That was her specialty.

She bounced down the hall, swinging her arms back and forth with her too long sleeves.  All she had to do was pick a target. Hmmm....that one!! That would would be perfect.

She recognized the girl from a previous incident; she’d been the one who had dumped coffee on Taro and the twins’ things.  She was currently laughing at something her friends were saying, all of them clustered around the vending machine near the cafeteria.  There were some scattered groups of Ra and Obelisk students around the cafeteria even though it was closed for the day, perched at tables playing regular games of Duel Monsters or doing homework.  Target was acquired so...now it was time to set the trap.

She sidled up to a group of Ra students that looked mostly friendly.  They were all crowded around someone’s phone watching puppy videos. She wobbled over to the nicest looking one, a bigger third-year boy with a round, friendly face who kept tearing up at every dog.  

She tapped him on the arm, looking wide eyed and teary.  He looked down. She noted the expressions quickly — he saw her looking sad and concern spiked in his face, then he saw the red jacket, and he looked a bit wary, and then he just looked confused and concerned again.

“Um, are you okay?” he asked.

Keiko sniffled loudly.

“I’m sorry,” she said.  “B-but I lost my favorite bracelet in here somewhere.  Have you seen it? It was from my grandma...”

Immediately, he sat up, looking fully invested.  Keiko sometimes wondered if she actually had some kind of magic influencing powers too.

“Hey, hey!  Don’t worry, we’ll definitely find it,” he said, patting her on the head.  “Where did you see it last?”

She let out a few more tears and wiped them away with her shirt sleeves.  Then she pointed over towards the vending machines, vaguely.

“I-I was at the table over there,” she mumbled.

He looked immediately a bit worried about the Obelisks over there.  One look at her trembling lips, though, and he was melted again.

“Give me a second, guys,” he told his friends, standing up from the table.  “Don’t worry, uh...what’s your name?”

“I’m Ueda Keiko,” Keiko sniffled.

He smiled and patted her head.

“I’m Maxim,” he said.  “Don’t worry, Keiko, we’ll find it.”

They wandered a few moments through the tables, looking beneath them and scrounging around, getting closer and closer to the vending machines.  Keiko wandered closer to the Obelisks, making a show of looking very focused on her search, not noticing how close she got to them.

“Hey, is this it?”

She looked up.  Maxim had found the bracelet she’d dropped while pretending to look.  She jumped up, squealing with delight. He jogged over to her and dropped it into her hands.  She spun in a circle with it, laughing.

“Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you!!” she said.  “Thank you —”

She placed her foot carefully so that she slipped onto one ankle.  She let her eyes widen and her arms flail, and tumbled back into the Obelisk girl.

She swore as the two of them fell down to the ground.  Keiko’s head actually did spin from the fall a bit, so when the Obelisk girl shoved her back off of her, she went with it and tumbled onto the ground.

“What the hell?” the girl shouted.  “Dumb bitch! Are Osiris dropouts challenged in _all_ possible ways?”

Keiko tumbled up to her knees, clutching the bracelet against her chest and pretending to cower in front of the Obelisk girl.  The girl pushed herself to her feet and marched over to Keiko, looming over her.

“What?” she shouted into Keiko’s face.  “You don’t have anything to say for yourself?”

Keiko made her lip start trembling.  This was the most tricky part of the operation.  Maxim looked nice, but he might not want to stand up to Obelisk for an Osiris.  The girl shoved her face closer to Keiko’s.

“What was that?” she said.  “Are you going to cry, dropout?  God, you’re so fucking pathetic!”

Keiko started bawling.  She turned the tears on, letting them waterfall down her cheeks.  She made a show of babbling something that might have been an apology but she was crying so hard that it was hard to hear what she was saying.

“Yeah, you’d better apologize!  I almost got juice spilled all over my jacket!!”

She turned around and snatched a can from one of her friends, and spun back to Keiko.  Keiko swore mentally as the girl made to turn it over Keiko’s head. She could take it, but that would definitely be a pain to wash out.

Maxim suddenly grabbed the girl’s arm, then, before she could turn it over.  The Obelisk turned and her eyes widened.

“Stop it!” he said.  “That’s enough! She didn’t do it on purpose.”

“Excuse me?” the girl said, trying to pull her arm free.  He let her go, but not before he’d snatched the juice can from her.  “I’m sorry, but what the hell do you think you’re doing?”

Maxim glared at her with all the force of a very decent person being pushed to his limits.  Keiko tried to remember that she was crying, so that she wouldn’t smile at her perfect choice.

“I’m tired of this!” he shouted at her. “I’m tired of you Obelisk thinking you can do whatever the hell you want!”

“Sounds like someone’s on the verge of falling into Osiris himself,” one of the Obelisks sneered.

“Hey, fuck you!” said a Ra from the table.  Maxim’s friends seemed to have caught on to what was happening.  “Maxim’s the top student in our grade — he could be an Obelisk any time he wants!”

“That’s likely!” the girl sneered.

“I didn’t transfer to Obelisk because you’re all like _this_!” Maxim shouted.  “You all act like you can do whatever you want!  Well, I’m done with ignoring it! You’re going to apologize to Ueda-san for harassing her!”

“Like hell I am!  Defending an Osiris means you just put a target on your back!”

There was a huge clamor from the Ra yellow table behind them as they all streamed over to back up Maxim.  Some of the other tables were all looking up now too, and a few Ra Yellows shouted in approval. Even one of the Obelisks from another table was nodding to what Maxim was saying.

Maxim folded his arms, glowering at them.  His squad was way bigger than the Obelisk girl’s at the moment, and she suddenly looked nervous.

“All right,” Maxim said.  “Then start shooting.”

He flicked out his pager and there was a low _oooh_ from the crowd.  He was about to send her a formal duel challenge!

Keiko hid her grin behind her sleeves.

 _I wonder if you can get a job starting wars,_ she thought.

* * *

“This school’s going crazy, huh?” Mylene said.

Xe moved her knight forward.  Diana didn’t even need to think about it, taking Mylene’s queen.  Mylene groaned.

“You’re too good,” xe said.

“I think very quickly and far ahead,” Diana said, sounding pleased with herself.  Then she frowned. “You’re right, though...I feel like the school’s gotten more tense...”

“It’s what happens when you stop being a doormat for people,” Mylene said.  “The power balance shifts and everyone runs around like chickens with their heads cut off.”

Xe grinned, though Diana looked less approving.  She sighed, putting her elbows on the table.

“I just wish we could all get along,” she said mournfully.  “I’m not used to this.”

Mylene leaned over the table and patted Diana on the arm.

“Hey, don’t worry.  I’m sure things will work out.  Just keep believing and stuff.”

Diana sighed, but she nodded.  Mylene moved another pawn, and Diana quickly moved into check.  Xe groaned again. Diana was too good at this.

Their game was brought to a halt, however, when someone kicked it over, sending their pieces clattering to the floor.  Mylene was on her feet in an instant, spinning to face their harassers in case it got physical. Diana just sat there, eyes wide and mouth hanging open as she stared at where the board had been a minute ago.

“So it looks like you Osiris kids have decided to grow a spine.”

Mylene glared.  Kylie Harbison stood over them, her arms crossed and eyes flashing.  Two more Obelisk kids were flanking her, and one of them appeared to have been the one who kicked the chess board over.  Mylene didn’t drop the gaze, refusing to be intimidated. Kylie scowled at them.

“Why are you doing this?” Mylene said.  “Don’t you have anything better to do than harass us? Like keeping up your grades so you don’t drop a class?”

Kylie’s lips curled.  She leaned in a bit.

“Listen up, you dropouts,” she said.  “You think you’re so special because you get all kinds of special treatment.  But you’re not. You’re slackers, about to drop out, with no futures. I’m just doing you a favor, getting you all kicked out before you make fools of yourself.”

“I think you’ve already got the fool part in the bag,” Mylene said.

Kylie’s eyes widened.  Then she started to snarl.

Diana was faster, though.  She stood up, put herself right in front of Kylie, and pointed a finger in Kylie’s face.  It was so startling that Kylie actually backed up.

“That is _enough_ ,” Diana said, her voice thick with emotion.  “That is enough! You will leave us, and everyone else, alone!”

Her voice rose up, strong and vibrating — actually vibrating, Mylene thought with shock.  Xe could feel the air starting to tremble around xir, and was suddenly reminded that Diana was actually a fairly powerful Duel Spirit.

“Yeah, lay off!”

The new voice came from behind Kylie, and she and her flunkies turned with surprised.  A pair of Ra Yellows stood in the hall, arms folded, glaring at them.

“You guys are making the school feel lame!” one of them shouted at Kylie.  “Stop stressing everyone out!”

A small crowd was beginning to form as people in the hallway were drawn into the little lounge from the shouting.  A few more Ra Yellows slipped inside.

“Osiris didn’t do anything wrong,” one of them said.

“You’re making the rest of us look bad,” an Obelisk in the door said.  “Lay off already. It wasn’t funny to begin with, it’s even less funny now.”

Mylene could hardly believe xir eyes.  Holy shit. Their plan was _working._ Even Obelisk was pushing back.

Kylie looked a little taken aback.  Her eyes widened, and her lips parted.  For a moment, she just stared.

“Kylie, we’re tired of this,” another Obelisk said.  “It’s bordering on immature.”

“Yeah, leave off!” shouted a Ra.

One Ra actually ran over to Diana and Mylene, taking Mylene’s slightly shaking hands and holding them softly.

“Are you okay?” they asked.

Another Ra was starting to pick up the chess board.  Kylie looked like she was about to implode. For a moment, Mylene was sure she was going to explode on all of them.

But then her wild eyes simply flashed to Mylene and Diana.

“This isn’t over,” she hissed.  “I _know_ you’re all hiding something.”

She turned, and shoved her way through the crowd.  Since it seemed the scene was over, most of them started to filter away, but a few stayed behind to help pick up the chess set and even chat a bit with Mylene and Diana.

Mylene couldn’t shake a sudden chill, though.  

How much did Kylie actually know?

* * *

For the first time in a while, the school seemed to have calmed down back to the normal day to day.  Saki breathed out a sigh of relief as she passed through the halls towards the library. A Ra yellow girl she didn’t recognize waved at her, and she blushed, waving back.  Well, thing weren’t back to normal entirely. Saki had noticed that a lot more people actually acknowledged her in the halls now, even though she barely knew any of them.

She ducked into the library, relieved.  It had been a stressful couple of weeks, that was for sure!  She was ready to just tuck into some homework and not think about it.

She took her time searching out the books she needed, enjoying the silence of the library.  One of them, however, was just a little too high over her head...

A hand reached over her and pulled the book down dangling it in front of her face.

“We really have to stop meeting like this.”

Saki breathed a sigh of relief, taking the book.  For a moment, she’d thought the hazing was starting again.  But as she turned around, it was just Kakon.

“Hello, Kakon-senpai,” she said.

“Hey yourself,” he said.  “How are you doing?”

“Better,” Saki said with a sigh of relief.

He blinked, looking confused.

“Did something happen?” he said.

“Huh?  Haven’t you heard about the Osiris and Obelisk war?” Saki said.

He frowned.  He pushed a hand through his hair.

“Wow,” he said.  “I must totally be out of the loop on that one.  Guess my studying has really distracted me.”

“I can’t believe you’d missed it,” Saki said, mouth dropping open.

“Well, fill me in.  Maybe I did notice but didn’t put the pieces together.”

So Saki filled him in on the last few weeks as they walked back to a table.  She took a seat across from him, starting from Kylie’s harassment of Haruka, up to the tag duel against her, to the organized harassment of Osiris and their pushback.

“Wow,” Kakon said, letting out a low whistle that echoed through the quiet library.  “You’ve had a busy few weeks, that’s for sure.”

“It’s been so exhausting,” she said.  “I just want to get back to regular old school, you know?”

Kakon nodded with a smile.  Then he frowned.

“I’m sorry I didn’t notice what was going on,” he said.  “I should have stopped some of it.”

“I mean, if you never saw it happen, there wasn’t much you could have done,” Saki said quickly.  “But...uh...”

She blushed, rubbing the back of her neck.  He tilted his head at her, then leaned across the table with his hands folded.

“But what?” he prompted.  “Don’t leave me hanging.”

“Well, the fact that I was friends with you was part of the reason I suggested that we try and, you know, form some bonds with the other classes to fight back,” she said, blushing.  “Kaede, too, but since you’re from Obelisk and you’re nice, I thought...well, I thought making allies wasn’t such a far off idea.”

Kakon blinked at her, lips parting.  Then he smiled.

“Aw,” he said.  “You know, I always hoped you thought we were friends by now, but this is the first time you’ve said it.”

Saki turned beet red.  She flailed her hands a bit, fumbling for words, rubbing her hands into her hair.  He just laughed, and it made her blush more. He rested his face on his hand, grinning at her.

“You know, Saki?  I think you’re pretty cool,” he said.

“What?  Me?” Saki said, eyes widening.

“Yeah, you,” he said.  “You saw a problem, and decided that instead of breaking more things to fix it, you should start putting things together.  You’ve got this sense about you. Like you’re real good at...encouraging people. Forging bonds with them.”

Saki blushed lightly, staring at her knees.

“I don’t think that’s something I’m very good at,” she said.

“Well, believe what you want.  But like I saw, your first thought was to start bringing people together.  Not only that, but you managed to get your friends to think that was a good idea, too.  That’s really incredible, Saki.”

Saki had to press her hands to her cheeks to hide the flush.  He laughed again.

“Well, I’ll stop bothering you,” he said, standing up.  “And let you get to your homework.”

He winked at her, and she smiled tentatively.

“I think you did a good thing, Saki,” he said before he left.  “Don’t think you didn’t.”

“Thank you, Kakon-senpai.”

He sent her another smile, waved, and headed back off into the stacks.  She turned back to her books. A sort of warmth blossomed in her chest. Maybe Kakon was right. Maybe she had done something to be proud of.


	20. Not Over Yet - The Teachers Convene!

Judai clutched at his coffee cup, resisting the urge to plunge his face into it as though that would wake him up.  Johan rubbed his shoulder, letting him lean against him.

They were the only people in the teachers’ lounge, but not for much longer.  Soon, the door snapped open, with just a little too much noise for Judai to handle.  He winced, putting a hand over his eyes at the spike of a headache.

He heard Chronos grumbling at someone, but he was too tired to quite pick out the words.  Yubel let out a breath.

_ You should have slept before the meeting _ , they scolded him

_ No time, _ Judai said.  _ Caffeine will have to do it. _

He took another long gulp of his coffee, ignoring the way it completely scalded his throat.  He’d tried to pour a five hour energy into it, but Johan had confiscated the energy drink before he could.  The caffeine was taking a while to hit.

“You look like  _ shit _ ,” Tania said as she strode in.

“Thanks.  You too,” Judai said groggily.

Thankfully, Tania had a good sense of humor.  She laughed her strange, growling sort of laugh, and moved into a seat, Misawa sitting down next to her.  Chronos was still arguing with someone, whom Judai slowly figured out was Asuka. She was talking low enough that Judai couldn’t quite catch her words as well as he could hear Chronos’ tone.

A few more footsteps shuffled inside, and there was a cheery  _ hello _ from Dawn as she followed Saiou and Midori.

After a little while longer, the last of those involved in this meeting filtered in, and Asuka stood up to close the door.  She sighed, returned to her seat as Judai tried to blink himself awake for this. She shot him a concerned look.

“Well, I guess we can start with why you look like you just went through a trash compactor,” she said, folding her hands in front of her.  “Where were you yesterday?”

“Spent all night going through an old Dark World temple,” he grumbled.  “And then spent the morning rechecking the seals where we moved the Phantasms.”

Midori frowned, eyes narrowing.

“And?”

“They look...fine.” Judai bit his lip.  “Actually, almost too fine. It’s like they haven’t even tried to test them since we’ve moved them.”

“That’s good, is it not, na no ne?” Chronos said.  “That means they are secure!”

“It is worrisome that such creatures did not make an attempt to even test their new bonds,” Tania said.  “The Phantasms are...not necessarily clever creatures when separated. They are like animals. Always throwing themselves against their bars.”

“Why were you in Dark World?” Misawa asked, turning to Judai.

Judai was never going to get used to Misawa’s beard, or his ridiculously deep voice.  He coughed once, and then took a long sip of his coffee again.

“Hinata is getting worse,” he said.  “Her attacks are coming more frequently.  I haven’t the slightest fucking clue what Armityle did to her.  Or even how it found her in the first place when it should be shattered into the Phantasms and sealed away.”

That made the room feel a little colder, and even Dawn hunched her shoulders up, looking downcast.

“I don’t believe for a second that Armityle gave her up for no reason,” Judai said.

“Maybe it’s honorable enough to have given the students their reward for besting it?” Midori said.

“I doubt it.  Armityle...from what little I know of it, it’s not the honorable type.”

“Do you think it gave up Hinata because it’s planning something?” Johan said.

Judai shook his head, exhausted.  He really should have attempted to take even a two minute nap before this.

“I don’t know.  I didn’t think Armityle was the planning type, either.  What all I know about it is that it’s a distortion, something that wasn’t supposed to exist.”

“Created by the god of destruction,” Tania murmured in a low voice.  “An aberration.”

“It’s not stable,” Judai said.  “It’s...mad, I guess you could say.”

He swallowed the last of his coffee, annoyed that it was already gone.  Johan silently plucked the cup from his hand and walked over to the coffee machine in the back to refill it for him.  Judai shot him a grateful look.

“I think Hinata might still be connected to it in some way, but any time I try and follow that connection, it triggers an attack.  I can’t do that to her anymore.”

The room fell silent again.  Asuka tightened her hands on the table, closing her eyes for a moment to inhale.

“So what is our plan, Judai?” she said.  “Do we go forward with the plans to remove the abandoned dorm?”

“Since the Phantasms aren’t sealed on this island anymore, the dorm isn’t a part of the seal, so removing it shouldn’t make any waves.  I’m just worried about...the echoes still left inside.”

He took the coffee back from Johan when Johan handed it to him, taking another gulp.  Dawn leaned forward — she had Pharaoh in her arms all of a sudden, the big cat snuggled up against her chest like a giant fuzzy baby.

“So we should go for it?  Clean it all out?”

“I think we need to,” Judai said.  “But I want to make sure there aren’t many students on the island when we do, in case there’s a problem.  Summer break would have been the best time to do it, but we missed it, so...winter break is what we should aim for.”

A few nods ran around the table.

“In the meantime, let’s all keep our ears to the ground for anything strange going on around the school, or in the dimensions,” Johan said.

Asuka nodded, and then she sighed again.

“Well, now that that’s taken care of...I think we should have a talk about the other elephant in the room.”

“The Osiris and Obelisk war, right?” Saiou said with a soft cough.  “It’s certainly not been so lively around here since I was in school.”

“I think we need to start thinking about if the set up we have now is sustainable,” Asuka said.  “And I’m just going to be blunt: it isn’t. It wasn’t when we were in school, and it’s worse now, especially since we’re using Osiris as a safe house for your students.”

She nodded at Johan and Judai.

“It’s absolutely ridiculous,” Chronos grumbled.  “I have put upwards of fifteen, no, perhaps twenty Obelisk students in detention in the last two weeks!  Gorgonzola. You’d think they would know better.”

“They’re kids.  They don’t,” Judai said, with a wry smile.

“What are our other options, though?” Johan said, shaking his head.  “Pulling down the whole hierarchical system sounds good to me, but the school sponsors probably won’t go for it.  Plus, it could be harder to filter all the powered kids into a group where we can help them the best.”

Asuka twisted her hands together, looking frustrated.

“It’s really not fair,” she said.  “That we have to separate them. That we have to be so secretive about it.  I know, I know, it’s for their safety. I just...it’s unfair that it has to be necessary.”

The rest of the room fell quiet again.  Pharaoh meowed because Dawn had stopped petting him, and she resumed.  Judai stared down at his second empty cup of coffee.

“I should have been here,” he said.  “I could have helped them out more if I wasn’t running all over the place.”

“We all have things we need to do to keep this school safe,” Johan said softly, slinging his arm over Judai’s shoulder again.  “You’re doing your best. We all are.”

“The children seemed well equipped to handle themselves, as well,” Saiou said with a small smile.  “I was quite impressed.”

Tania made an approving grunt, grinning.  For a moment once again, no one spoke. Then Asuka sighed again, and stood up.

“I guess that’s all we really need to go over right now,” she said.  “Anyone else have anything to report?”

There was a brief scattering of shaken heads and  _ no’s _ from the others.

“Good, great.  If anything comes up later, come see me in my office,” Asuka said, pushing her hair back to fix her ponytail.  “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have five more boxes of neglected paperwork that dear Samejima left behind when he retired so abruptly.”

Judai sent her a reassuring smile, but she was too frazzled to notice it, bustling off back towards her office.  Judai stood up too, and swayed. Johan had to hold him by the shoulder.

“You haven’t been sleeping  _ or _ eating, have you?” he scolded.  

“I’ve been fine.”

“Yubel, is he taking care of himself?”

Judai wasn’t able to stop Yubel from slipping themself to the front, his eyes going bi-colored and his fangs lengthening.

“No, he absolutely is not, and he won’t listen to me, either,” Yubel said through Judai’s lips.

Johan raised his eyebrows at Judai as Yubel slipped back beneath the skin, and Judai blushed furiously.

“Traitor,” he muttered at Yubel.

_ This is my body too, you know.  Take better care of it. _

“Come on, you.  Let’s get you some breakfast,” Johan said, guiding Judai out of the teachers’ lounge.

* * *

Judai sighed, reluctantly lugging back the giant bag of extra breakfast foods that Johan had forced him to take back to his room.  Johan had to go teach a class, and Osiris classes weren’t until later today, so Judai walked back by himself.

He wandered up to the first-year dorm, glancing over it. It was still pretty old and beat-up looking on the outside, although they had renovated the rooms.  Manjoume’s old room had been remade into the first-year dorm bathroom, something that had annoyed him to no end when he had found out.

But other than that, the dorm looked exactly the same as it had when Judai had been to school.  It was nostalgic. He smiled as he lugged the bag up to the door, fumbling with his keys to let himself into his room on the first floor.  The dorm was quiet for once — everyone would be at class by now. Normally, it was a pretty steady cacophony of kids stomping around, yelling, throwing things at each other, laughing, or playing music really loudly until someone shouted at them.  And of course, the rumble of kids practicing magic or trying to summon holograms inside their rooms even though they weren’t supposed to. Judai couldn’t help but roll her eyes. Kids. That made him feel nostalgic too.

He let himself in and dropped the food on the table.  He hesitated a moment before sighing and doing the adult thing of putting everything away, especially the cold stuff in the fridge.

_ “Kuri, kuri!” _

He glanced up to see Winged Kuriboh flutter in through the wall.  It bounced off of his head in greeting, and he smiled, reaching up to pet it.

“Hey, buddy.  Haven’t seen you around in a while.  What have you been up to?”

Winged Kuriboh immediately launched into a squeaky explanation of everything that it had been doing, complete with bouncing up and down and spinning in the air and doing loop-de-loops to illustrate.  Judai still wasn’t sure if it was even possible to learn the Kuriboh language, so he just smiled politely, trying not to laugh when Winged Kuriboh bounced off of things in its exuberance.

He finished putting away the milk and closed the fridge.  Winged Kuriboh still squeaked at him. Then, suddenly it stopped, pausing in the air, wings vibrating.  It looked up, as though trying to look through the ceiling.

“What’s up?” Judai said.

Winged Kuriboh flew forward and bumped him in the face, and then flew upwards through the ceiling.  Judai stared up where it had gone for a moment. It returned a moment later through the right wall, zooming right to him and headbutting him in the chest.  It had the consistency of a stuffed animal, though, so it didn’t feel like anything and it bounced right off of him, tumbling through the air.

It squeaked very insistently at him, flying up and down towards the ceiling and back to him.

“What’s wrong?”

Winged Kuriboh grabbed his jacket and tugged on it.  Judai stood up, and Kuriboh flew towards the door and back to him.

“You need me to see something?”

_ “Kuri!” _ it said, nodding its whole body.

Judai frowned.  What could have gotten into it?  He followed Kuriboh out, and it led him up the stairs to the second floor of Osiris, bumping its face against the first door.

“In there?  No one should be here, buddy.  They’re all at class.”

Winged Kuriboh shook its whole body indignantly, and bumped into the door again even though it could have passed right through it.  Judai tried to remember who was in this room this year. Room 1-1, was...Keiko and...oh, and Haruka.

Feeling a bit uneasy, Judai tried the handle.  It was unlocked. He opened it just a crack.

A soft, choked sob echoed from inside.  He hesitated again. Was this an invasion of privacy?  Did a student really want their teacher to come in and ask what was wrong?  What would he have wanted when he was this age?

_ I would have wanted someone to notice just how much it hurt _ , he thought.   _ I wouldn’t have really minded who it was. _

He knocked on the door, and the sobbing sound cut off.  

“Hey,” he said softly.  “Are you all right?”

No one answered.

Winged Kuriboh squeaked, and passed through the door inside.  Judai waited, biting his lip. Who was still here? Keiko didn’t seem the type to be crying alone in her room and skipping class, but then, neither did Haruka.  Haruka was...he wasn’t sure what to think about Haruka. She mostly sulked in the back during his classes, never asking or answering questions. She’d never summoned her spirit partner, and when he’d asked if she’d like to introduce her partner, she’d snapped at him.  He’d heard from the Elemental Mistresses that she’d been rather rude to them as well, though that could mean anything, since the Mistresses were always very vague when it came to people acting out, preferring not to bring attention to poor behavior.

He thought about maybe just leaving her alone.

But then Winged Kuribohs squeaked, and came tumbling out through the door from inside as though it had been smacked away.  Was there someone else in there?? Was Haruka in trouble? He flung the door open, and light flooded into the dark room.

“Are you all right?” he said.

“Get out!! Go away!”

Haruka’s voice broke as she flung a desk lamp at him.  Yubel’s reflexes reacted, snagging it out of the air in front of his face.  Haruka stood just in front of her bed, her eyes puffy and red from crying, gasping for breath.  Judai quickly put both of his hands up, still holding the desk lamp.

“Hey, hey,” he said in a low, soothing voice.  “It’s okay. I’m sorry, I just thought maybe you were hurt.”

“Fuck off!” Haruka gasped, her eyes wide and still bubbling with tears.  “Keep that thing out of my room!”

He blinked, lips parting.  What thing?

He glanced at Winged Kuriboh, who was hiding behind Judai’s shoulder now.  It was vibrating, clearly nervous but also desperate to zoom over to Haruka and comfort her.  He looked back to Haruka, brow furrowing.

“Are you all right?” he said.

“Just leave me alone,” Haruka gasped, pressing back against the bed.  “All of you! I didn’t want to be here!”

“Haruka-san, breathe, just breathe,” Judai said.

“I never should have come to this fucking school!  You monsters are everywhere — haven’t you already done enough??  Leave me alone!!”

Judai flinched, and he felt Yubel let out a nervous hiss.  Was Haruka talking about Winged Kuriboh, or him?

“Haruka-san, I’m not going to hurt you,” he said.

He put the desk lamp down on the threshold, backing up.

“I thought you were hurt.  That’s all. I’ll give you some space...if you need anything, you can come talk to —”

“No!  Leave me alone!  I can’t  _ trust you _ !”

He’d backed up enough for her to run to the door and slam it shut, flinging the desk lamp back out on the deck.  He could hear her collapse on the other side of the door, sobbing. It took everything he had not to try and burst in there again.  There had to be something he could do, right? He couldn’t be expected to just sit here and let her break down, could he?

_ She doesn’t feel comfortable with you _ , Yubel said softly.   _ Sometimes, it’s all right to step back. _

_ I did that once and almost everyone I loved died, _ he reminded them.

They didn’t respond.  Judai stared at the door for another long moment.  Winged Kuriboh squeaked at him with concern.

He ran a hand over his face.

“Fuck,” he whispered. 

But there was nothing else he could do.  He turned, and he walked slowly back down to his room.


	21. Haruka's Broken Heart - Inferno Tempest vs Buster Bladers

“Nina, don’t swing the basket around; you’ll smush the sandwiches.”

Minato snatched the basket it back from Nina, who immediately pouted at them.  Saki smiled, shaking her head. Minato tucked the basket into their arms, oofing slightly at the weight.

“How much did you _make,_ Saki?” Minato asked.

“Just enough for everyone to share,” Saki said.

“You mean for an entire army?”

“It’s not that much!”

“Taro eats a lot.”

Taro grinned, wagging his tail good-naturedly.  Miu yawned, and Mewfeuille copied her, draped in her arms like a liquid.  Angel sat on Saki’s head, flicking his tongue at passing butterflies. Both spirit partners were solid today, as Minato was trying to practice keeping spirits in the physical realm for as long as possible.  They were hoping to be able to bring their own spirit partner over once they figured out if they had one, and practicing with Miu and Saki’s friends were the easiest way to do it.

They followed the winding path through the woods behind the school, birds flitting over the path over their heads.  It was getting cooler out — fall was on the way. The leaves weren’t changing colors yet, but it was brisk, and the squirrels were out gathering nuts in full force.

Saya and Hinata’s little house quickly appeared between the trees, and Nina charged ahead, Taro hot on her heels.  She’d already knocked on the door, and Saya had already answered by the time Saki, Minato, and Miu made it over.

“Hey guys!!” Saya said, immediately scooping Nina and Taro into a big bear hug.

“Saya-senpai!  How are you doing?” Nina said.

“Can’t complain, can’t complain.  You guys causing trouble?”

“Of course!”

Saya grinned, letting go of them to ruffle Nina’s hair.

“That’s my girl,” she teased.

Saki, Minato, and Miu finally caught up to the others, and Saya’s eyes fell on the basket in Minato’s arms.

“Whoa!  When I said you guys could bring lunches with you, I didn’t mean you needed to bring enough to feed an army!”

“That’s what I said,” Minato said, grinning.

“Hey!  They’re easy to make!  I got carried away!” said Saki, blushing furiously.

Saya grinned, reaching over to ruffle her hair next, and then grabbing Miu in a big hug.  Miu grumbled in protest at being squished.

“I’ll give you a hug once you put that basket down,” she said to Minato, whose cheeks darkened and they mumbled that they didn’t really need a hug.  “Why don’t you guys go out back? I’ll bring neesan out.”

“Is it all right for her?” Miu asked, sounding concerned.

“Yeah, she needs some fresh air once in a while.  I’ll be right back.”

She disappeared back inside, and for a moment, the group hovering on the threshold awkwardly.  Minato finally cleared their throat, and led the way around to the back of the house. Angel leaped from Saki’s head to scamper ahead, and then dove into some bushes to chase something he’d heard moving around.

There was a nice grassy clearing in the woods behind the small cottage, with a thick pad of grass that felt pretty soft to sit down on.  Saki had Minato put the basket down and fussed inside, pulling out a large blanket.

“Geez, you thought of everything,” Nina said.

“It never hurts to be prepared!” Saki said.

She and Taro laid the blanket out on the ground, and as they smoothed it down, Saya came around the house with Hinata.

She looked a little worse than usual, the dark circles under her eyes even darker and her steps short.  Her long hair had been put up into a messy bun, which was starting to fall out. She had to lean on Saya for most of the way out, and she was gasping for breath when Saya finally helped her sit down on the blanket.  Saki frowned. Shouldn’t Hinata be feeling better the longer she was away from her imprisonment? It seemed like she was just slowly getting worse.

“God, I can’t wait til I can walk like a normal human being,” Hinata said.  “Hey, kids. How are you all doing?”

“Hanging in there,” Minato said.  “How are you feeling?”

“About the same as ever; like I got run over by a garbage truck.”

Saya sat down next to her, and Saki tried to ignore her worry by busying herself by unpacking the picnic basket.  Hinata asked how school was going, and Nina immediately launched into a detailed explanation of all of the awful homework that she was positive their teachers had conspired to give them all at once.  Miu set Mewfeuille down beside her as she sat down, and the little cat yawned and curled up tightly atop the blanket.

“Oh, by the way,” Saya said, accepting a sandwich from Saki with a smile and a nod of thanks.  “I heard that shit was going down with you guys and Obelisk? Are you guys all okay? I know they can be nasty.”

“Oh, we mostly managed,” Minato said, waving a hand.

“Yeah, once the other students started pulling for us, it was really easy to deal with!” Taro said, already chewing a big bite of sandwich that was muffling his words.  “It was a pretty intense war, though.”

“Obelisk still gets mean during interclass duels,” Miu grumbled.  “Miu is very tired of getting formal duel requests.”

Saya laughed.  Angel returned from the woods, shaking off his fur with a snap, and then scampering over to Saki to steal a bite of her sandwich.  She pushed him away, laughing and pointing to the sandwich she’d left specifically for him.

“Geez, you guys are getting all the fun stuff,” she said.  “Not, I mean, that being bullied is fun, but like — I dunno, man, we never go to wage war on Obelisk when I was in school.  We were all just real focused on doing our thing, and they’d haze occasionally and then be cool again.”

“I wonder what made things worse this year,” Hinata said, frowning.

“We’re pretty sure it’s cause they were mad that Saki and Saya were the representative duelists for the grad duel last year,” said Nina.

“Sore losers, then, I guess,” Saya said, nodding as though that made perfect sense.

“Ugh. Obelisk’s definitely always been that way,” Hinata said, rolling her eyes.  “So many politics, all the time.”

Saki sat back down on the basket, having unpacked and passed out all the sandwiches.  She didn’t take a bite of hers yet, wondering if it was okay to ask Hinata what she was thinking.  She hated to make Hinata think too much about the past.

Luckily, or maybe not, Nina asked exactly what Saki had been thinking.

“Oh, yeah, Hinata-san, what dorm were you in when you were in school?” she asked.

Hinata winked.

“Obelisk,” she said.  “Sorry, I know that makes us mortal enemies and all.”

“Neesan here is a card carrying _nerd_ ,” Saya said.

Hinata shoved her playfully, and Saya made a show of collapsing to her side and sticking her tongue out as though she were dead.

“I don’t want to hear that from someone who was the top of the _entire_ school her third year!” Hinata laughed.

“What can I say, we all make mistakes sometimes,” said Saya, still pretending to be dead and talking with her tongue still sticking out.  “Mine was becoming a bookworm last year. But never again!”

She punctuated this declaration by shooting straight up to a sitting position and pointing to the sky.  Everyone laughed, and Saki had to cover her mouth to avoid spitting crumbs everywhere.

“You wanna know the truth, though?” Saya said, letting her hand fall back to her lap.  “The only reason I studied so hard to become the valedictorian...it was because I wanted to have the best duel ever to finish my time here at Duel Academia.  And I couldn’t think of a better arena for it.”

She shot Saki a big grin, and Saki ducked her head, blushing.

“And Saki here really gave it to me!” she laughed, reaching over to ruffle Saki’s hair and almost making her drop her sandwich.  “We need to have another one sometime. Gotta fix that draw score we’ve got!”

“You know, you already beat me once,” Saki pointed out.  “So you’ve already technically won.”

“It’s not about the win-loss ratio!  It’s about making it a better duel every time!”

Angel yawned and curled up beside Saki’s knee, tucking his tail over his nose.  He’d made short work of the sandwich already.

“By the way, Sacchan — how’s it been going with alchemy lately?”

Saki’s eyes widened, and she flushed.  Immediately, all eyes were on her.

“Alchemy?” Minato said.

Miu tilted her head with confusion, and Taro’s and Nina’s mouths both dropped open.  Saya glanced around, and then exchanged a glance with Hinata.

“Don’t tell me,” Saya said.  “You never told anyone after you did it the first time!!”

“I... I meant to,” Saki fumbled.  It was definitely not helping her case.  “I really did!! Honest! But once I got home after all of that, you all jumped on me about a paper that was due, and I totally forgot!  And then there was midterms, and Matsushita-san, and the Obelisk war...there’s been a _lot_ going on!”

Saya humped, folding her arms and pouting.

“No excuses, Sacchan!  I’ve been waiting for more alchemy bros!”

“Wait, wait, wait, back up,” Minato said.  “You can do alchemy, Saki? Since when? What happened?”

“Tell us all the details!!” Nina said, leaning forward with excitement.

Still blushing, Saki quickly recounted how she’d formed the medallion by combining Saya and Hinata’s powers, to make something that would keep the attacks at bay.

“Speaking of which...do you still have that?” Saki asked Saya.

Hinata tapped her breast pocket, nodding.

“Does it...still help?” Saki asked, ducking her head.

Hinata grimaced.

“I feel like it does sometimes?  But the attacks might be coming too frequently for it to handle.”

“Hey, don’t feel bad about it,” Saya said, clapping Saki on the shoulder.  “Your first couple of alchemical creations aren’t going to be perfect! You’ve got to _practice_.”

“You need to tell Yuki-sensei and Andersen-sensei!!” Nina cried, throwing her hands in the air.  “You can join Mylene! I know xe’s been really upset that xe doesn’t have anyone to practice with!”

“I — I promise I’ll tell them, as soon as I get back to see them,” Saki said quickly.

Minato was rubbing their chin thoughtfully, as though still considering the story.

“So, you can forge...other people’s powers together to make items from them?” they asked.  “Is that an alchemy thing?”

“Alchemy can take all kinds of forms, but at the core, it’s about making something new by combining separate elements,” Saya said, spreading her hands out like she was a teacher. “My specialty is physical alchemy, using real world stuff and changing its nature by combining it with other stuff.”

To demonstrate, she plucked a rock from the ground along with a blade of grass.  As easy as breathing, she smushed the two between her fingers, and when she opened her hand, she had a small puff of moss on her palm instead.

“Whoa,” Minato said, raising their eyebrows.

“Cool!” said Taro.

“Okay, the one non-Osiris here is confused,” said Hinata, frowning at that.  “You’ve explained the basic idea of the Osiris classes to me before, but what’s the difference between being a magician and being an alchemist?”

“I’m glad you asked!!” Saya said, brightening.  She jumped to her feet and began to gesture like a professor.  “Magicians cast spells by directing energy and channeling the forces of their own souls.  Alchemists combine already existing energies outside of themselves to create something new.  Magicians _can_ cause things to combine into something new, but their approaches are totally different.”

She gestured to the moss in her hand.

“A magician could maybe do this, but they’d need to study a lot of different forces, come up with some sigils and correct passageways to direct the energy to command the natural world to conform to what they want it to do.  Whereas I, an alchemist, can just take two things and smush them together.”

She tossed the moss into the air and caught it again before sitting back down with a plop, making the blanket floof at the edge nearest her.

Saki bit her lip.

“But I didn’t...smush anything together when I made that medallion,” she said.

Saya shook one finger, tutting softly.

“Nothing you could _see_.  See, there are a couple forms of alchemy.  Like I said, my specialty is physical alchemy, and it’s the most common type.  But there’s also organic alchemy and ethereal alchemy.”

“What’s the difference?” Miu asked.

“Organic alchemy is what we’d probably call Polymerization,” Saya said.  “It’s a type of alchemy where you combine two or more living and sentient creatures into a new creature.  It’s more common for Duel Spirits to know this kind of alchemy, and they’ll use it to combine themselves with others for different reasons.  It’s also not permanent, and can be ended at any time by either member of the fusion.”

She tapped her hands on the blanket.

“Meanwhile, ethereal alchemy, which seems to be what Sacchan has, is when you combine _energies_.  It’s a less tangible form of alchemy, but it has tangible results.”

She nodded to the medallion in Hinata’s pocket.

“Sacchan harnessed both mine and neesan’s signature energies, took a small piece of them, and forged them together into something new.”

Saki could only gape at the explanation.   _That_ was what she had done??  How on earth had she done something like that?  And how could she repeat it?

Saya leaned forward and bopped Saki on the nose, making Saki squeak with surprise.

“And that’s why you need to tell Judai and Johan!! So that you can get trained for it!”

“How did you know what I was thinking?” Saki said, blushing.

“You’re super easy to read,” said Nina with a laugh.

They all giggled a bit, with Saki ducking her head and trying to hide her furious blush.

Angel suddenly stood up beside her though, hackles raised.  Saki’s eyes flashed to him, eyes wide. Was he reacting to another one of Hinata’s attacks?

But no, he turned towards the woods.  He didn’t growl, but he did begin to thrash his tail back and forth in agitation.  Saki sat upright, turning towards the woods with a growing nervousness.

“Something wrong?” Nina asked around another mouthful of sandwich.

Minato rolled up onto one knee, tensing.  Saya’s hand fell to something in her pocket, and Saki wondered what kind of stuff a graduated alchemist might carry around for potential self defense.

For a long moment, nothing happened, except at Angel continued to thrash his tail.

Then there was a scuffling sound, a soft swear, and Saki saw someone moving through the woods.  She saw the red jacket first, and stood straight up. Was someone hurt or lost?

Then Haruka stumbled through foliage, and Saki tensed.

A cacophony of emotions she couldn’t settle cluttered her head.  On one hand, just seeing Haruka activated her fight-or-flight response at this point, and she felt an anticipatory panic seep into her chest.  On the other hand, Haruka’s eyes were red and puffy, and she looked just as shocked to see all of them there as they were to see her.

She immediately drew back, hands crunched into fists.

“What are all of you doing out here?” she said, her voice cracking.

“Sitting. Eating. It’s a public campus for everyone,” Minato said, lip curling slightly.

Haruka’s eyes snapped to where Angel was whipping his tail around and her eyes widened.  She took a huge step back towards the woods. Saki could sense, now, why Angel was agitated — it wasn’t that he was upset to see Haruka, although she could sense his distaste as well.  But as he crept forward towards her, nervously whipping his tail, she could tell that he was mostly concerned. Concerned about...her ankle. She could sense his eyes flicking to it, and wondered if maybe she’d twisted it or something.

“Are you all right?” Saki asked.

Haruka’s eyes were on Angel, and her breathing was getting a little panicky.

“Oh, like you care,” Haruka snapped.  “Just keep your little monster away from me.”

Angel stopped approached her, letting out a frustrated hiss.

“Angel’s only concerned!  He thinks you’re hurt!”

“Yeah, well, I don’t really care about what it thinks!  I can’t believe you’re just letting it sit out around like that!  What if it hurts someone?”

“Angel wouldn’t hurt anyone!  And if you think Mewfeuille is actually going to wake up just to harass someone, you don’t know it at all.”

“Shut up!” Haruka said, eyes flashing.  “Just shut up! Stop defending them!”

“Stop attacking them when they did nothing to you!” Saki shouted back, actually trembling now.  “Why won’t you even give them a chance? What’s _wrong_ with you?”

“What’s wrong with _you?_ ”

Saki was going to start shouting again when a hand dropped onto her shoulder.  She looked back, startled, to see Saya standing next to her, looking at Haruka.

“Sounds to me,” Saya said, “like you girls have something you need to settle, one way or another.”

Saki blinked with surprise when Saya pushed a Duel Disk against her chest.  Where’d she grabbed that? Oh...right. She’d left her disk in the bottom of the basket.  Just in case.

Haruka was already wearing hers on her wrist, and her eyes narrowed as Saki took the Disk and looked at it dubiously.  Saya stepped back, folding her arms.

“And you know what the best way to settle a dispute like this at Duel Academia is?  With a duel,” she said.

Saki could almost hear Minato rolling their eyes.  But her hands tightened around the Disk, eyes fixed on Haruka.  If they dueled, maybe Saki could get through to her. Maybe she could show her that trusting your monster and dueling with them was the way to win.

Haruka glowered at them both for a moment.  Saki was almost positive that Haruka was about to refuse.

“Weren’t you going to prove that you didn’t need monsters to win?” Saki found herself blurting.  “Well, prove it to me, then!”

That got a reaction out of Haruka.  Her eyes widened, and then narrowed, her lips curling.  She immediately loaded her deck and turned on her Duel Disk.

“Bring it on,” she said.

Saki walked away from the picnic blanket, taking up a spot on one side of the empty part of the clearing.  Haruka moved to be across from her. Saya stood before the picnic blanket, in between them, her arms folded.

“All right,” she said.  “Duel!”

Both of them drew their cards.

“I’ll go first,”  Haruka said, before Saki could claim the first turn.  “I set two cards and end my turn.”

 _Inferno Tempest and D.D. Dynamite, probably,_ Saki thought, tightening her hands.   _But Inferno Tempest can only activate if I do three thousand damage at once.  If I whittle her down with just under three thousand attack at a time..._

“My turn!” she called.  “Draw! I start off by summoning my friend, Buster Whelp of the Destruction Swordsmaster to the field!”

Angel leaped from the picnic blanket and onto the grass in front of Saki, letting out a protective growl.  Haruka’s lips curled.

“I activate his effect!  By tributing him, I can special summon a Buster Blader from my hand.  Angel, call your friend to the field!”

Angel let up a low keen, and then became light.  The light swelled to form the hulking body of Buster Blader before her, lifting its sword over its shoulders.  Saki thrust her hand forward.

“Buster Blader, attack directly!”

Buster Blader had only twenty six hundred attack points, so it couldn’t activate Inferno Tempest!

“I activate my face down — Forbidden Chalice!” Haruka shouted.

Buster Blader halted in its charge as a large golden chalice appeared before it.  As though in a trance, it took the cup and drank, somehow getting the liquid in through its face mask.

“When this card is activated, one monster on the field gains four hundred attack, but its effects are negated,” Haruka said.  “I’m giving Buster Blader four hundred more attack!”

Oh no!  That made its attack exactly three thousand!

Haruka threw up her arms over her face as Buster Blader’s holographic sword swooshed through her body, making her shudder as her life points dipped to one thousand.  But then she pointed to her other face down.

“Inferno Tempest!” she shouted.  “Now what are you going to do, when you have none of your monsters to fight with you!”

Saki screamed.  The heat of the fire almost felt real, even though Haruka wasn’t a psychic duelist, as it exploded outward from Haruka.  The heat pulsed around her, matching the rage and anger in Haruka’s eyes. Buster Blader even flinched back from it.

Saki’s deck began spitting out cards, and she had to hurry to grab at them, as Angel also exploded out of the graveyard and she had to catch his card too.  Heart in her throat, she tucked the banished monsters into her deck box at her belt. She still had Buster Blader, though! If she attacked next turn, she won!

“My turn,” Haruka said.  “First, I activate from my hand the spell card Raigeki!  It destroys all monsters on your side of the field!”

A storm of lightning struck down over them, and Saki couldn’t help but scream.  Buster Blader actually spun around, leaning its body over Saki to take the brunt of the electricity.  She cried out, reaching for where it had been when it shattered.

“I’ll set one card, and end my turn,” Haruka said.  “Well? Show me what you can do now.”

She was...alone.  She was all alone.  Buster Blader had tried to protect her, but there was nothing it could do.  And she...what could she even do now? Her hands trembled as she reached for her next card.

“Don’t give up, Saki!” Minato shouted.

“Yeah, show her who’s boss!” Nina shouted.

Saki tried to smile, but her hands were still trembling when she pulled her next card free.  It was no good. She needed a monster to activate this! She looked desperately at her cards, but she’d had no other monsters in her starting hand aside from Angel and Buster Blader.  And other other spells and traps were support cards — nothing that would work on their own, without the monsters she needed. And it was only a matter of time before Haruka drew into D.D. Dynamite, and Saki lost the game.

“I...I pass my turn,” she mumbled.

Haruka let out an angry huff.

“See?” she said, drawing her next card.  “A deck that relies on monsters is so easily crippled!  Without them, you’re helpless!”

She smacked a card into the spell zone.

“If they ever abandon you, or betray you, then you’re all alone!  You’re not even strong enough to defend yourself!”

The spell card Poison of the Old Man activated, and Saki flinched back as a haggard old man dumped a gross purple potion over her, dealing damage to her life points.  Haruka activated her face down then, Chain Detonation, and whittled her down five hundred more life points.

“This is what happens when you rely on them,” Haruka said.  “As soon as they leave you, you’re weak, and helpless. You can only rely on your own power!”

She set another card and ended her turn.  Saki’s hands were still trembling. What could she even do??  She had nothing to work with in her entire deck. She had far fewer cards in her deck than Haruka, too, and she’d deck out long before she could come up with a strategy.  Tears came to her eyes, lips trembling. Was it true? Was it really all over?

She looked desperately towards her friends.  Minato, Taro, and Nina were still shouting their support, and Nina was making a raspberry at Haruka, who didn’t even pay attention to them. Miu was watching with a stern intensity that wasn’t normal for her.

It was Saya’s intense gaze that caught Saki, though.  Her eyes bored into Saki’s. There wasn’t encouragement in her gaze.  

Only a burning, glimmering sense of _challenge_ .   _Don’t you dare give up_ , those eyes said.   _It’s too early to give up._

But what...what could she do?  She turned back to her cards. She stared at her deck, mouth dry.

“What’s wrong?” Haruka said.  “I thought you were going to trust your monsters?  I guess that didn’t get you far.”

_Trust...trust my monsters.  That’s what I wanted Haruka to see.  I wanted to understand how important my monsters were to me._

She tightened her grip on her cards.  She inhaled, and exhaled.

“I do trust my monsters,” she said.  “But more than that, Matsushita-san — I trust all of my cards.  And I’m sure...I’m sure my deck will respond to my heart!”

She put her fingers onto her cards, and exhaled once more.

“I draw!”

For a moment, she couldn’t look.  The sun glinted through the trees, and off of the back of the card, and she finally cracked open her eyes and looked.  Her eyes widened. She felt the warmth pulsing through her arm from the card, and the banished cards in her deck box grew hot against her hip, and she knew, without a doubt, that her monsters had responded to her.

“I activate my spell card,” she called.  “Call of Beginning!”

Immediately, the air around them seemed to turn to glass, refracting light in all directions and giving the world a shimmery, unearthly glow.  Haruka’s eyes widened.

“What are you — ” she started.

“When this card is activated, I send one monster from my Extra Deck to the Graveyard,” Saki said.  “In order to return monsters equal to its summoning conditions to my hand from banishment!”

She lifted her arm and selected one card.

“I choose World Dragon!  And I send it to the Graveyard to add World Buster, Buster Blader, and Buster Whelp to my hand!”

She dug the cards back out of her banish pile, and Haruka glared.

“That won’t help,” she said, eyes flicking to her face down card.  “Summon whatever you want, your monsters can’t make you win!”

Saki ignored her, continuing her turn.

“World Dragon has a special effect — when it’s in the Graveyard, I can Synchro summon it using monsters in my hand, as long as I use two Tuner monsters for the summon!”

Haruka actually swore.  Saki sent the three monsters in her hand to the graveyard, and the glowing Synchro gates appeared before her.  

“Shining new slayer, take the new blade from your partner’s maw and open up a new world! Synchro summon!” she called.  “Appear now, level nine — World Dragon, the Beginning of Swords!”

Her dragon descended to loud cheers from her friends.  Its long body, sleek and sinuous, shining from the thin, luminscent white feathers that tightly coated its snake-like form, curved down to hover in front of Saki.  In each of its six pairs of legs it carried a different kind of sword, but despite the weaponry, its blue eyes were calm and tranquil.

Saki, renewed by the power of her dragon, pointed forward.

“This is what happens when you trust your monsters,” she said.  “World Dragon! Direct attack!”

“I activate my face down!” Haruka shouted, eyes wide.  “Curse of Memory! When you declare a direct attack, I negate the monster’s attack and destroy it — dealing you damage equal to its attack points!”

A thick cloud of black smoke poured out of the card, billowing out and around World Dragon.

“You’ll be finished off by your own monster!” Haruka shouted.

But Saki wasn’t afraid — how could she be, when World Dragon’s calm presence was right beside her.

“World Dragon can’t be targeted or destroyed by effects,” she said.  “So Curse of Memory has no effect! World Dragon, continue the attack!”

World Dragon soared through the air with the grace of a rainbow curving over the sky.  Gently, as though it knew that it was a powerful being, it tapped one of its swords atop Haruka’s head, the hologram passing gently through her.

Her life points hit zero, and after a beat, World Dragon dissipated.  The adrenaline of the match wore off much faster than Saki would have liked.

Before her, Haruka stood with her eyes shadowed by her bangs.  She was trembling softly. Saki just tried to breathe for now, getting her heart to slow down.  But now that she wasn’t focused on the duel...she was wondering about Haruka. And about some of the things she’d said.

“Matsushita-san?” she asked. “Are you okay?”

“Shut up,” Haruka snapped.  “This doesn’t prove anything.  You were just lucky.”

She turned and started to storm away, but Saki called out to her one more time, stepping forward.

“Matsushita-san — did something happen to you?  Did something happen with your monsters? With your spirit partner?”

Haruka actually flinched this time.  Saki could hear her breath trembling.  It took her a few moments to compose herself enough to respond.

“That’s none of your fucking business.”

Then she was storming off into the woods again, and she was out of sight.  Saki stared after her, lips parting.

Nina let up another cheer, but Saki couldn’t help but feel a little hollow at her victory.

Still she turned back to her friends.  And Saya was smiling at her. She patted Saki on the head as she walked back.

“You did good,” she said.  “It was a great duel.”

Saki nodded, but her stomach still twisted.

“I wish I could do something,” she said, eyes filling with tears.  “She seems so...upset.”

Saya only hugged her, gently.

“You did what you could,” she said softly.  “And now it’s up to her to decide what to do with it.”


	22. A Familiar Face Returns!! - Saito’s Bonding Time!

Nina ran full tilt into the mess hall, so fast that other people might expect that she was late for something.  She was not, of course, as it was three hours before classes would start today, but there was no point to walking just because you had plenty of time!  Running was way more fun!

She skidded to a stop, however, as she burst through the doors and her eyes fell on the couple at the back table who were currently eating each other’s faces.

For a second, Nina only gaped with the shock of it.  She noticed a very familiar frizz of pink hair, gathered up into a familiar side ponytail.

Then Saito Hibike detached herself with some effort from Reina, and looked up to see who had disturbed them.  Reina turned beet red, but Saito only grinned.

“Well, if isn’t Nina!” she said.  “Long time no see, squirt.”

Nina let out a squeal.

“Saito-senpai!!” she shrieked.  “When did you get here?!”

* * *

The mess hall was jam packed by the time classes were over.  Saito was already surrounded, grinning and sticking her tongue out at a few questions, refusing to let go of Reina’s hand under the table.  Reina looked happier than Nina had seen her look in months, her smile huge and her bangs actually pushed away from her eyes for once so that everyone could see the sparkle. Her spirit partner, Winter Cherries, was doing loop de loops over her head, clearly mimicking Reina’s excitement.

“So, who’s this?” Mylene whispered to Nina under the commotion.

“That’s Saito-senpai!” Nina said back, bouncing up and down with excitement.

Mylene’s eyes sparked with recognition.

“Oh man.  You mean the upperclassman who made that shadow game Taro and I went up against?” xe asked.

“That’s the one,” Taro said, smiling with a little less enthusiasm.

“I can’t believe she’s here, out of nowhere,” Saki said, eyes wide.  “I wonder what she’s doing here?"

“Probably just to visit,” Minato said.  “Look at her — she’s totally eating up the attention.”

Saito did in fact have the hugest grin on her face, looking immensely pleased at all of the attention she was getting.  She laughed loudly, and grabbed people around the shoulders with one arm for teasing hugs.

The doors burst open then, and the excited chatter briefly died down.  For a moment, all eyes turned towards the door.

Saya stood in the doorway, her arms still flung out from where she’d pushed the doors open.  For a moment, everyone was just looking at her, and Saito, who were both staring each other down across the room.  It was hard to read Saya’s expression — she was completely, utterly unreadable.

Saya marched across the room, and students parted to let her past.  She came to a stop in front of Saito’s table, still staring her down.  A strange tension came over the room, and Nina suddenly remembered that they had been roommates in school, and that Saya had often been chased out of her room by whatever demon Saito had summoned that night.  Were they about to fight?

Then Saito grinned, leaning forward so that she could rest her elbows on the table and her chin on her folded hands.

“Well hey there, Saya-chan,” she said.  “How’s it going?”

Saya leaned over the table and grabbed Saito around the shoulders.  Saito’s expression immediately melted from smug to shocked as Saya squeezed her in an awkward hug.

“You!!!” Saya cried, her voice lifting with excitement.  “You little shit!! You didn’t tell me you were coming!”

She finally released the still shell-shocked looking Saito, sticking her tongue out between her teeth and squeezing Saito’s shoulders with a warm cheeriness.  Saito blinked out of her surprise, and coughed quickly.

“Well, I wanted it to be a surprise,” she said, trying to look smug again.  “I see you’re happy to see me.”

“You’re easy to miss when you’re not around.  When you are around, it’s a different story,” Saya teased, punching her on the shoulder.

Saito grinned and punched Saya back.  The tension broke, and it was like the entire room let out a huge sigh of relief.

“But for real, why now, of all times?” Ren asked.  “What made you come to visit?”

“Well, mostly it was because I had a lull in my work,” Saito said, running a hand through her hair.  “And Reina and I have wanted to visit for a _while_.”

Then her eyes cut across the room, searching as many faces as she could in a breath.

“Also, I caught wind that someone beat the game I left behind,” she said.  “And I _had_ to see who it was.”

Mylene and Taro exchanged a glance.  Tentatively, Mylene ended up raising her hand, and reluctantly, Taro did too.  Saito’s eyes sparked with surprise.

“I don’t know you, but I’m kinda surprised you got in on it, Taro-kun,” Saito said, indicating Mylene and Taro in turn.  “Props, kids. I thought that was a hard one.”

“It was pretty hard,” Mylene said.

Nina tried to resist the urge to pout.  She’d really wanted to get in on that action, too.  But she hadn’t wanted to send Taro after the Phantasms when he was clearly so nervous about them.  And even after all that, she was pretty sure Taro and Mylene hadn’t even told her everything about the shadow game!

Saito yawned, making a show of stretching. Saya sat down on the table in front of her, twisting so that she could still see her.

“So what’s up?  What have you been doing since graduation?” Saya asked.

“Nothing much.  Got a decent part-time job so I can fund my actual job,” Saito said.

“Which is?”

Saito grinned.

“I’m a ghost hunter and an exorcist,” she said.  “Not much work at the moment, but I’m sure word of mouth will catch on eventually.”

Mostyn laughed.

“That’s definitely a job for you,” he said.  “Have you kept up with any of the other graduates?”

“Oh, for sure.”

“Everyone except me?” Saya said, pouting.

“Oh, shut up.  I text you.”

“Like, once every two months!  And they’re stupid texts too, like, look at this one!”

She shoved her phone at Saito, and then at Reina.

“‘Look at this sick ass stick I found’?” Saya said, shaking her phone.  “Honey, is this the one you want to be dating?”

“This is the one I want to be dating,” Reina said.  She was so happy that she was actually managing to rearrange the words she copied to make more sense than usual.  Nina smiled.

“It was a sick ass stick, though,” Saito said.  “I thought you’d appreciate it.”

Jian snapped her goggles against her head to get attention, and Saito glanced at her.

“So do you know what Kotone’s been up to?  I heard she was job searching, but she got too busy to text more after that.”

“Oh, yeah!  She just landed a job at KaibaCorp in the technology department.”

Jian’s eyes lit up, and she punched the air.

“Hell yeah!  You go Kotone!”

“So is it true that Elias went to law school?” Saya asked.  “He always talked about it.”

“Whoa, card game school to law school?  That’s a jump,” said Minato.

“Yeah, he did, and he’s soooo superior about it too.  Like, he thinks he’s being all jovial, but he’s so bragging,” Saito said, waving a hand.  “He goes to college in the same town I work in, that’s why I know about that.”

“He wanted to be a lawyer for Industrial Illusions,” Saya explained to a few confused faces.

Saki sighed, leaning her face on her hands and looking thoughtful.

“I hadn’t even thought about it before now, but we never really heard from the graduates what they did afterward,” she said.  “I never would have even considered lawyer as an option after Duel Academia. Really makes you realize how open everything is.”

“I heard Maristella is working in the pro leagues already,” Lin said with a faint smile.

“Oh, yeah, I just watched her last match!  She’s doing great!” said Ji-U.

Nina counted on her fingers, trying to remember all of her graduated senpai.  She raised her hand and waved it in the air.

“Nina, you don’t have to wait for someone to call on you,” Eun snickered.

“So that was everyone except Mori-senpai, right?  What’s he doing?”

Saito frowned.

“Actually, didn’t keep up with him, so I’m not sure,” she said.

Saya folded her arms and chuckled proudly, grinning.

“Ah-ha!  Something I know more about than you!” she said.

Saito rolled her eyes, and gestured for her to continue.  Saya decided to bask in the glow of having more knowledge for a few more seconds before she went back to her explanation.

“Mori started his own shop.  He sells and fixes watches,” Saya said.  “And he uses his alchemy to give them a little more protective elements than normal watches.  That’s not advertised, of course.”

“Ooo,” Nina said.  “Now _that’s_ cool!”

A spurt of chatter burst up around the room as everyone started discussing the news about the alumni, or talking about Saito’s appearance, or discussing old memories from last year, or even talking about what they might do when they graduated.  Nina didn’t even want to _think_ about graduation right now!!  That was like, so far away!! She wanted to enjoy high school!

Saito seemed to have a similar idea, because she suddenly stood up, her eyes alight with excitement.

“You know what?  Now that I’m here for a while, we should have some fun to celebrate.”

Saya immediately jumped off the table and took a humurously large step back.

“Oh no.  I know what you consider fun, Saicchan.  No way. Don’t haunt this building for these poor kids again.”

“Geez, you always think the worst of me,” Saito said with a huff, rolling her eyes.  “No, I was thinking of something more fun!! It might not be summer anymore, but it’s not too cold yet — let’s do a test of courage!”

Nina _immediately_ leaped out of her seat and let out a whoop.

“Yes!! Yes!! Let’s do it!!  I’ll start making up a box to draw lots from!”

She grabbed her school bag and ripped out some pages from a notebook, writing down numbers.  Saito grinned at Saya.

“See?  Nina’s down,” she said.

“What are you going to put on the courage test?  You’d better not put these kids in danger!”

“Re-lax, Saya.  Geez, you’d think you were their mother or something.”

Nina finished ripping off the pieces with numbers on them, and then ran over and stole Minato’s hat.  They swore at her, but she was already back at her table dumping the lots inside.

“Okay everyone!!  We have an equal number here, so go ahead and pick one!”

She ran around the room so that everyone could pick a number.  Saito rubbed her hands together, looking very excited.

“All right!” she said.  “The sun goes down in one more hour.  Meet us at the path into the woods then if you’re down to play!”

* * *

Saki hurried over to the group already milling about at the woods entrance.  She’d spent the past hour trying to decide if she was actually going to go and face whatever horrors that Saito had definitely put into the woods for them, and had finally decided that since it seemed like most of the people who had drawn lots were planning on going, she didn’t want to leave her partner alone to have to go by themselves.  So she ran up to join the group, huffing and puffing.

“Um, who’s number fourteen?” she gasped, holding up her slip.

She was surprised and relieved to see Minato raise their hand, jogging over to her from the other side of the group.

“Groups one through five have already gone through,” they said.  “I was starting to think I’d be going myself.”

“Sorry!” Saki said.

They just laughed, shaking their head.

“It’s cool.  I wouldn’t have gone by myself if you hadn’t shown.”

A scream rang through the woods, and Saki yelped, jumping five feet into the air.  Minato looked at her with concern.

“You don’t like ghosts, are you sure you want to do this?”

“Y-yes!!” Saki gasped.  “I don’t...want to be the only one who didn’t!”

“I mean, we can just ditch, and hang out by ourselves,” Minato said.  “It’s not a problem.”

Saki shook her head very quickly, enough that her hair smacked her in the face.  Minato frowned at her with confusion.

“Why do you want to do it so badly?” they asked.

She hesitated.  She clasped her hands in front of her for a moment, biting her lip.

“I...I’ve been scared of a lot, especially this year,” she said.  “And last year...god, it was so scary, being up against Armityle. And things seem to get a little scarier every day.  So...so I think I need to face my fears, at least once. So that I can get stronger.”

When she looked up, Minato’s eyes were soft.  They smiled softly, reaching for her hand and squeezing it.

“Well,” they said.  “If we do it together, it won’t be too bad, right?”

Another scream rang out of the woods, and Saya and Anani came racing out of the other end of the path — Anani was a neon green with fright, and Saya was dragging her along by her arm, looking pale as a bone with her glasses crooked.

She didn’t even stop running once they were out of the woods, both of them bolting straight back towards the dorm.

Minato and Saki exchanged a glance.

“We could still totally bail,” they said, grinning nervously.

Saki licked her lips and gave them a nervous smile.

“H-how bad could it really be??”

It felt like an agonizingly long time to wait.  They were the last group, and with every scream and yell from in the woods, and every pair who came racing back out the path looking pale and freaked out, Saki’s anxiety got worse and worse.

Nina and Mylene raced out of the woods laughing their asses off despite looking super freaked out, and they both collapsed to the ground and kept laughing and laughing.  Saki guessed that was one way to deal with fear.

Saito, who had very conveniently been paired with Reina (Saki suspected cheating), came prancing out of the woods with Reina only fifteen minutes after they had left, both of them still smiling and holding hands as though they’d just taken a nice walk in the woods.

“No fair,” Saki grumbled.  “Saito-senpai was the one who set the whole thing up.”

Morgan and Eun came back out both looking vaguely amused, Morgan still chuckling to herself.  Eun actually looked disappointed, sighing as she came back out and shaking her head. She glared jealously at the trembling Taiki, who’d gotten Akiara for his partner.

Taro and Ren both came racing out, both of them pale and Taro making some distressed yipping noises, his ears plastered to his head and tail flagging wildly.  Ren had to stop and rest, doubled over and gasping, so clearly frightened that he hadn’t even been able to make a sound, but Taro just ran in circles, barking and yipping until he finally calmed down a few minutes later.

The other groups went by in a blur.  Saki was starting to feel a little faint with panic.

And then, finally, it was Minato and Saki’s turn.

They stood at the mouth of the pitch black forest, and Saki wished she’d been one of the first groups.  The sun had been peeking just a bit through the woods at the beginning, but now it was full dark, and only the stars gave any small light.  Minato held the flashlight that they’d been given for their team, flicking it on. For a moment, they both just stood there at the mouth.

Saki willed herself to stop trembling.  Angel sat at her feet, rubbing his shoulder against her.  Minato looked across at her.

“You sure you want to do this?” they asked.

Saki nodded, not trusting herself to speak.  After a beat, she felt Minato slip their hand into hers.  She blinked with surprise, but they weren’t looking quite at her.

“Don’t forget,” they said.  “We’re together. We’ll be safe as long as we’re together.”

Saki’s lips parted.  Then she nodded. She squeezed Minato’s hand.  She felt a spark of their power pulse through her palm, and beside her, Angel grew solid.  He preened himself and shook his fur, and then trotted off in front of them.

“He’s not scared at all,” Minato joked.

“It helps being a dragon, no matter how small you are,” Saki said breathlessly.

They followed Angel into the woods.

Every tree and shadow made Saki want to jump and speak.  Minato held her hand tightly, the only lifeline she had in this pitch dark.  Minato swung the flashlight around, keeping a careful look at their surroundings.

A squirrel darted away from their light and Saki screamed, grabbing hold of Minato.  They dropped the flashlight trying to catch her, and for a moment, the two almost fell over.  But Minato kept their feet, holding Saki tightly. For a moment, they both just stood there, hearts racing against each other.

“Sorry,” she whispered.

“Don’t be.  I was scared too.”

They waited another moment before Minato reached down for the flashlight again.  Saki stayed clinging to Minato’s hand as they made their way further into the forest.

It was almost worse that nothing seemed to be happening.  Her anxiety increased at every second, searching for some sign of some awful monsters that Saito would have left for them.

“Hey, Saki?” Minato said.

“Y-yeah?” Saki said, trying not to stare too much at a rock and imagine that it was actually a face.

“Uh...this probably isn’t the best time to talk about this.”

“No, please talk, it might make me stop being in my own head,” Saki gasped.

Minato swallowed, gripping her hand.

“I just...I feel like I haven’t thanked you.”

That was startling enough for her to look up at them and completely forget that they were on a nightmarish forest expedition.

“Thanked me...?  For what?”

“For...for reaching out to me.  Last year, you know? I was pretty rude to you when you first tried.  But you did anyway. I remembered it when I watched you trying to reach out to Haruka, too.”

Saki’s lips parted.  She could only see the back of their head, their short auburn hair and their floppy cap as always pulled over it.

“Well...I think I should thank you too, then,” Saki said.

“What?  What have _I_ done?”

“You’ve always supported me,” Saki said, squeezing their hand.  “You’re always around, checking up on me, making sure I don’t spread myself too thin.”

“That’s just what friends do, though.”

“Well, thank you, then.  For being my friend.”

They hadn’t realized that they’d both stopped.  Minato was still holding her hand, and she was suddenly very aware of it.  Was her palm sweaty? It must be sweaty, she’d been so nervous this whole time.  Oh, geez, they must hate holding onto it. Why was she so worked up about her sweat all of a sudden??

It was dark, and even with the flashlight it was hard to see their face, but she felt like they were probably looking at her the way she was looking at them, and she couldn’t put a word at the moment to what she was feeling because it was all cluttered up with anxiety and fear, but this other feeling was something nerve-wracking but good.

But then her eyes flickered.  And she saw something standing in the bushes behind them.

She _screamed_.  Minato swore, whipping around and putting themselves in between Saki and the thing in the bushes.  Saki’s eyes swam and for a moment, she was pretty sure she saw a woman in a white dress with long black hair standing there — but then the next second, she was gone.

“Oh my god oh my god oh my god oh my god,” she gasped.  “You saw that, right?? Right?”

“I did,” Minato said, voice shaking.  They swung the flashlight around to see if it was still around, but it was nowhere to be seen, and that was even worse. “Let’s keep walking.”

She nodded, still clinging to their hand with both of hers.

Angel started darting around the trees and into the bushes, as though scouting out the path ahead, but that was almost worse because she kept jumping every time he rustled the bushes or darted through her field of vision.

Minato swung the light around more.  There were things all over the path and near the edges, now.  First, it was just piles of rocks stacked on top of each other, but slowly, the piles looked more purposeful, and were bolstered with sticks to look like small structures.  There were old wooden masks hanging from the trees, the first one making Saki scream out loud when she saw it and thought it was something else. She looked behind her once and thought she saw a flicker of white, and she wasn’t entirely positive that it was Angel.

“You hanging in there?” Minato asked.

She could hear the tremble in their voice, but they were trying so hard to sound brave.  Oh, no, she had to...she had to try harder too, so that Minato wouldn’t have to be so scared and try all by themself.  She inhaled sharply, and focused on Minato’s hand in hers.

“I’m fine,” she said, putting on a brave face.  “Well, I’m scared, really scared, but I — I can make it.  As long as we’re together.”

“We’re together,” Minato agreed, tightening their grip, and Saki thought that it must be just as reassuring for them as it was for her.

The masks were getting more plentiful now, and there were also big straw dolls hanging from the trees, and oh, god, it was like something out of a horror movie.  She saw another flicker of white and oh god Angel was on the other side of the path so that wasn’t him at all —

She saw the woman in the white dress appear again, right behind them, and she shrieked.  By the time Minato swung the light around, the woman was gone again. They swore.

“This is fucked up,” they mumbled.  “This is really fucked up, Saito, really, really, really fucked up...”

Saki hyperventilated.  She clutched at her throat and then at her chest, trying to will herself to breathe more smoothly.  She could do this. She could do this!! It wasn’t real; she’d faced real demons before, this wasn’t real!

She could see the exit to the woods up ahead, the faintly brighter opening outside of the darkness and the distant shadows of their classmates.  Saki let herself breathe. They were almost out. They were almost out!!

Minato seemed to relax a bit too seeing the exit.  They sped up, pulling Saki up behind them.

Saki heard a twig snap behind her.  She made the mistake of looking back.

The woman’s face was literally two inches from hers.  And then her hair blew back to reveal her face and Saki _screamed_.  Something about teeth and a too wide mouth and maybe holes for eyes or maybe too many eyes or —

She shrieked.  Minato yelled, swinging the flashlight back as though to hit it, and this time the woman didn’t disappear immediately, and Saki was crying she was so terrified and then —

A low shriek cut the air, not hers or Minato’s, but a twin pair of squeaky cries.  A flutter of bat wings smacked her in the face and then there were a multitude of small black shadows swarming the ghost woman, making her actually stumble back.  Angel leaped out of nowhere next, hissing and spitting.

Minato didn’t wait to figure out what was happening.  They grabbed Saki’s hand and bolted for the exit.

They burst free of the woods.  Saki couldn’t hear over the screaming of her heart and the pounding of her lungs, she could barely see even for the panic, but then Minato tripped as they came back into the group and she was holding their hand so tightly that they both went collapsing face first to the ground.

For a moment, they both just laid there, gasping.  Saki felt Angel pad through the grass, laying down next to her and licking her ear in reassurance.  She flopped her free hand up to pet him, and then pushed her face into his fur.

And then someone clapped.

“Nice job!” Saki was pretty sure that was Nina, but she was too rattled to be sure.  “We all made it through!! Gold stars for everyone!!

Minato slowly sat up first, and Saki was _still_ holding their hand, so she pushed herself up alongside them.  Angel crawled into her lap, vibrating. They both sat and heaved up breaths of grateful fresh air, free of ghosts.  Saito was laughing her ass off somewhere, and Saki felt for just a moment one fraction of the frustration that Saya must have had while having to live with her.

A faint fluttering caught her attention then, and someone yelped.

“Hey, I thought the ghosts would stay in the forest!” someone said.

Saki almost passed out.  She whipped around in place, and a scream lodged in her throat at the sight of the tiny, doll-like creature with bat wings that was stumbling from the woods, her hands pressed over her face.  Oh, NO, it was going to take its hands away from its face and be horrifying again —

But Minato let out a little yelp of surprise.  They jumped to their feet.

“Krus?” they said.  “Hang on — I didn’t summon you, though!  I didn’t even have my cards —”

Two more little shadows swooped from the sky, chittering and laughing in squeaky, high-pitched voices.  One of them swooped at Minato’s face, and they spluttered when it landed right on their face.

Saki was so shocked and numb that she only stared.  It was a tiny, gray-skinned demon creature, with bright blue pigtails and big bat wings, dressed in a skimpy black outfit.  A second tiny figure with wings, landed on Minato’s head from the other side, clinging to them and giggling — it had a funny face, with big jagged teeth and a red mask, and the same gray skin and proportions of the other one.  

Minato gagged as they pulled the first one off of their face by the back of its shirt, and it hung there, snickering and giggling.

“Topi!” they said, eyes widening.  “And...”

They reached back and grabbed the other one by the nape of its neck, holding them both in front of them.  

“Lurrie?” they said, sounding shocked.  “What the heck?”

Saki’s brain was coming back to her, and she was putting the pieces back together.  Krus, Topi, Lurrie...those were the names of some of Minato’s monsters, right? She’d only seen them duel a few times, but she’d looked through their deck before — it was a Fabled monsters deck, and those three little monsters were some of their tuners.

Minato released Topi and Lurrie and let them spin around the sky, still giggling, and ran over to Krus to scoop her up like a tiny child.  She kept her hands over her face, but she peeked between her thin, doll-like fingers to reveal a not so scary big blue eye looking nervously at everyone.

Minato had to swat at Topi and Lurrie as they continued to shriek and spin over their head.

“What the hell?” they grumbled.  “How did you guys get here?”

“Whoa,” Jian said, leaning over with wide eyes.  “You just psychic summoned them? Without your cards?”

“I’ve...never summoned them outside of a duel,” Minato admitted, cheeks darkening.

Saito let out a low whoop.

“Hey, look, the game did something cool!” she said.  “Minato just learned how to summon their spirit partners!”

“ _Partners_?  Plural?” they said, flabbergasted.

“Yeah, some people end up having more than one,” Jian said.

Minato looked so shocked that Saki almost giggled from the sheer giddiness of it.  Topi swooped down in front of her, and she flinched, but it only seemed to be looking at her.  After a beat, it grinned a huge jagged smile, and twittered something at her that she didn’t understand.

Saki smiled a bit.

“You guys tried to come to our rescue, right?” she said.  “Thank you. You’re Topi, right? It’s nice to meet you. I’m Saki!”

Topi twittered as though to say _I know that, dummy_ , and then swooped away, still giggling.

Minato looked still flabbergasted, with Krus in their arms, and Topi and Lurrie swooping around them and squabbling over the perch on their head.  This time, Saki did laugh. All of the anxiety hit hard, and then released with the giddy, shaking laughter.

Soon, the whole group was laughing, laughing from the relief, from the ending, or just from sheer joy.

 _I wish our fun days like this could last forever,_ she thought.  _Just being together is the most fun of all._


	23. The Growing Unease — What’s Beneath Duel Academia

“All right, Taro!  Spill it!”

“Spill what?”

Nina put her hands on her hips, blocking Taro’s door.  Taro frowned at her. Nina was usually an early riser, but he still wasn’t used to her showing up at his door first thing in the morning.

Nina pointed a finger near his eyes, and he crossed his eyes trying to look at it.

“I know you and Mylene learned something else from the game ghost,” Nina said.  “And I don’t know why you won’t tell me! The rest of us all shared our findings!”

“No one really had any findings,” Taro pointed out.  “And that was weeks ago now, Nina — why does it matter now?”

It was true.  Despite their best efforts, no one had really had anything to show for their excursions that day.  Ji-U seemed to have had a grand old time leaving pranks for Obelisk, and Takako reported that they’d had a nice chat with Alice the doll, but she hadn’t noticed anything out of the ordinary, except that the Obelisks seemed more antagonistic this year.  Toitoi and Miu couldn’t even find where the old well had been because it was so well filled in and the grass had grown over it. Saki and Minato had climbed up and down the stairs for an hour but nothing had happened, not even a little spark of magic. Eun and Akiara had ended up talking to Daitokuji about when Yuki-sensei and Andersen-sensei were in school, which were fun stories but not useful to their investigation.

And Nina’s tip about the catacombs that led to where the Phantasms had once been kept had ended up being wrong.  She and Mi-Gyeong hadn’t found their way in, or seen anything in the caves except rocks.

“Come onnn,” Nina said  “I thought we always shared our secrets!  I told you about my weird mole.”

Taro rubbed the back of his neck, licking his lips several times.  It wasn’t that he didn’t want to tell Nina about the second thing the ghost had said.  But after the adrenaline had passed, he realized that it had probably been a lie. He’d only won one truth and it had given it to him, as unsatisfying as the answer had been.  The second part was probably just to scare him. That ghost had seemed pretty mean, and liked to lie even during the game about things that were important. Taro didn’t want to worry people more than they had to be when his own panic had gotten a probably false answer.

“I just don’t know why it matters right now?” Taro said.  “You didn’t pester me about it back then.”

“That’s cause you still looked upset!  And then the war with Obelisk happened, and we got distracted!  But now I wanna know!”

Taro bit his lip.  Nina pouted at him, giving him her best puppy dog eyes.  Finally, he broke, sighing.

“Okay, okay,” he said.  “But listen, I don’t want to make people worried!  So I don’t want to spread this around because it was probably just messing with me.”

He explained the second answer the ghost had given him, and also how the game worked in more detail so that Nina could understand why he thought it was probably just messing around with its answer.  

Nina normally would have started jumping up and down and yelling about such a reveal.  But instead, she looked thoughtful, rubbing her chin.

“So it said old things we knew were stirring in the abandoned dorm, and then it said Armityle was already here?” she said.  “I guess those two things are connected, but if was lying...hm.”

She frowned.

“Do you know the steps to play the game with it again?  Maybe we can ask it a more specific question.”

“Oh no, no way,” Taro said, whipping his tail back and forth anxiously.  “That thing is really dangerous. Mylene and I destroyed the instructions for a reason.  I think it might have killed us if we had lost.”

To his surprise, Nina didn’t push it.  She just sighed, slumping forward.

“You’re probably right,” she grumbled.  “I hate being responsible!”

She folded her arms, pouting.  Then she grabbed Taro’s arms.

“You know what?  We should just go ask Yuki-sensei or Andersen-sensei ourselves!”

“Huh?  Really?  Do you think they’ll talk to us about it?” Taro said.

“Well if we pester them, they’ll have to tell us something!  We can tell them about Saito’s ghost, too.”

“Will we get in trouble?” he said, licking his lips nervously.

Nina considered this.

“Let’s talk to Yuki-sensei first,” she said.  “He seems pretty laid back about stuff like this.”

* * *

Saki found Kakon at the same table as always, holding his forehead in his hands as he stared down at the books in front of him.  He was keeping his eyes open with his pinkies pulling his eyelids back.

“Really fun reading, looks like,” Saki said.

Kakon jumped a bit, looking up.

“Oh, hey, Saki-san,” he said.  “Who’s your friend?”

Minato sent Kakon a very suspicious look, and Saki sighed.  Once they’d learned about her friend in Obelisk, they’d insisted on meeting him.  The war with Obelisk had tapered off, but there were still a few skirmishes here and there, and Minato seemed a little wary of Saki meeting an older Obelisk by herself.  Saki was more than happy to introduce her friends, as long as they played nice.

_Speaking of playing nice..._

She shot a look into the back aisle while Minato introduced themself.  She caught the flicker of Angel’s tail as he ran behind a shelf, chasing off a giggling Lurrie.  Ever since Minato had first summoned their monsters, Lurrie, Topi, and Krus had been clinging to them.  Minato’s sight of them without summoning them was a shaky at best, and they kept accidentally giving them energy to physically summon any time their spirit forms landed on their head or back.  Angel was trying to keep them away for now while they were in public, but there was only so much her friend could do when there were three of them all trying to cling to Minato.

“Well, it’s nice to meet you, Fujita-san,” Kakon said.  “Saki’s told me about you.”

“Really?” Minato said, glancing at her.

“Yup!  Well, I’ve heard about a lot of her Osiris friends.  You all seem like a fun bunch.”

“You should come visit sometime,” Saki said as she sat down across from him with a smile.  Minato sat down beside her, looking at least somewhat appeased by Kakon’s friendly manner.

“So what are you reading?” Saki asked, leaning over.

Kakon rolled his eyes.

“Boring history stuff,” he said.  “It’s history of the school, specifically.”

“That’s definitely pretty specific,” Minato said, tilting their head.  “Is that for a class?”

“Yeahhh, it was a poor choice of elective on my part.  Analysis of Modern Dueling Trends.”

He rolled his eyes again, and Saki sent him a sympathetic smile.

“Definitely sounds rough,” she said.  “Is that a map?”

“Huh?  Oh, yeah.  It’s an old blueprint for the school, before it was built.  Wanna see?”

Kakon turned the book around so that Saki and Minato could lean over it.  

It looked pretty much the same as their school’s layout now, Saki thought.  Well, no, there were a few differences. There was a wing for the cafeteria labeled on the opposite side of where it was now.  And as she read over the proposed areas for different things, everything was all over the place.

“Were the three dorms actually attached to the school in this plan?” Minato said, pointing.

Saki looked down with surprise.  Sure enough, Minato was right: there were several wings labeled _dormitories_ attached to the school building itself, around where the card shop and large lecture halls were now.

“Oh, yeah,” Kakon said, nodding.  “You know, in the original plan, there wasn’t any separation of classes into Obelisk, Ra, and Osiris.  It was just separated by grade.”

He pointed at the map.

“See here?  This was the first-year dorm, and the upperclassmen dorms were deeper in.”

“Whoa,” Saki said.  “I don’t know how you think this is boring!”

Minato mumbled something that might have been _nerd_ , but when she shot them a look, they just grinned at her, and she rolled her eyes at the good-natured jab.

“Not all of us read statistical textbooks in our spare time,” Kakon said, raising his eyebrows at Saki.  She blushed. He turned the book back towards him, though, looking over the map again.

“Makes you wonder, right?  All of a sudden, this whole plan changed.  They made the three separate dorms, and scattered them all over the campus.  It doesn’t even make much logical sense, where they put them.”

A distant memory niggled at Saki’s mind.  Hadn’t someone said something about the placement of the dorms to her last year?  Something about...the gods...a seal...

She remembered at about the same time Minato seemed to, since they drew in a breath and recognition sparked in their eyes.  It had been Taro who had said something last year. The placement of the dorms was in a particular sort of seal, something that would suppress and imprison the Phantasms as their perfect opposites.  Saki wondered when they decided to hide the Phantasms here — and why at a school?? Wasn’t that dangerous?

“Penny for your thoughts?” Kakon said, and both Saki and Minato startled.  They quickly exchanged a glance — it wasn’t like they could tell Kakon what they were thinking about!

“I was just thinking about how weird it was too,” she said quickly.  “Like, it really doesn't make sense for Osiris to be so far away from the school.

“Right?” Kakon said with a chuckle.  “You know the rumor though, right?”

“Uh,” Saki said, eyes widening with a faint panic, quickly looking at Minato.  They shrugged helplessly, looking just as thrown off. “No, I don’t know the rumor.”

Kakon laughed, as though amused by their expressions.

“Don’t look so worried, this isn’t a pop quiz,” he said.  “It’s the rumor that Kaiba Seto, the school’s owner, decided to put in the dorm system as a jab at his long-term rival.  You know, how he had Obelisk in Battle City, and then the King of Games, Mutou Yugi, had Osiris?”

 _Ohh_ , Saki thought, suddenly relieved.

“Oh, _that_ rumor,” she said with a smile.  “I think everyone’s heard that one.”

“We should really ask the twins to confirm that for us,” Minato said.

Kakon snapped his book shut, shaking his head.

“Well, studying is boring,” he said.  He reached under the table and pulled up a box from under the table, wiggling his eyebrows.  “There’s three of us today, so let’s take turns facing each other in chess?”

“Sure!!” Saki said.

“Nerds,” Minato said, with a shake of their head.

* * *

It took them about an hour to find Yuki-sensei, since he wasn’t in his room.  Finally, Taro managed to sniff him out, finding him at the harbor fishing. He glanced up before they could call out to him, and smiled, raising his hand in a wave.

“Hey,” he said.  “What’s up? Need something?”

“Yuki-sensei!  We want to ask you what you know about what’s going on with everything!” Nina demanded.

Yuki blinked at her.  Then he cracked a smile.

“There’s a _lot_ going on, so you might need to be more specific,” he said.  “Otherwise we’ll be here for a while.”

Nina nudged Taro on the ribs, but he hesitated, looking nervous.  Nina rolled her eyes. Fine, okay, she’d take over.

“So Saito-senpai left us a demon game to play,” Nina said.

Yuki paled.

“Oh, no, did she haunt the dorm?  Do you need me to exorcise something?”

“No, no, no,” Nina said.  “Here, let me start from the beginning.”

She explained as much as she actually knew from what Taro had told her, without exactly admitting that it had been Taro and Mylene who had gone on the adventure instead of her. Taro eventually admitted it himself, though, although he still didn’t bring Mylene into it. Yuki got progressively paler until the story was over.

“So we don’t know what it meant, or if it was lying, but we’re worried, Yuki-sensei,” Nina said.  “And if something’s going on, we want to help!”

Yuki hesitated a moment, his tongue sticking out between his lips.  Then he sighed. He reeled his fishing line back in and turned to face the two of them, nodding for them to sit down across from him.  They plopped down.

“Well, first off — I’m glad you’re all okay,” he said.  “Second, I feel like I’m supposed to scold you for looking into this demon game without telling us, but I’ll be honest — I would have done the exact same thing, and the important thing is that you guys are okay.  It looks like you handled it as best you could.”

Taro let out a huge sigh of relief, and Nina patted him on the shoulder.

“He was worried he’d be in trouble,” Nina said.

Yuki let out a thin laugh.

“Are you kidding me?  You guys are way more responsible than I was.  Besides...someday you _are_ going to be facing things on your own.  The least I can do is respect your ability to choose to do it.”

He rubbed beneath his nose for a minute.

“And in answer to your question...yeah.  Some spooky stuff is going on around the school.  I’m sorry we didn’t tell you kids, but we didn’t want you to worry when we didn’t have all the information.”

Nina glanced at Taro, who blushed.  That sounded like the exact same reason Taro hadn’t told her the truth about what the ghost had said.

“Is it Armityle?” Nina asked.

Yuki frowned.

“I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t want to jump to any conclusions.  But the Phantasms were moved somewhere else, and it doesn’t seem like they’ve gotten out.”

“Armityle shouldn’t be able to show up if the Phantasms are separate, right?” Taro said.  “So how did we meet it last year? And how did it kidnap Hinata-san?”

“Those are all questions we’re trying to answer,” Yuki said grimly.  “And we don’t know much more than you do. I’m sorry I’m not much help.”

He hesitated.

“The truth is, the magic in the abandoned dorm should have faded away years ago.  It should just be an old hunk of wood by now. But it’s suddenly gotten worse since Hinata came back.  The echoes of magic are real deep.”

Nina and Taro exchanged a nervous glance.

“Does that mean...what does that mean?” Taro said nervously.

“I don’t know.  But that’s why you kids should stay away from it — as much as I want you to be confident in your abilities, there are some things we shouldn’t do rashly.”

He inhaled and exhaled heavily.

“The truth is, kids, we don’t really know what’s going on, or if we’re all just seeing ghosts that aren’t there.  But what you said that demon from the game told you...I’m sure there must be something going on in that dorm.”

“Why was it left there in the first place?” asked Taro.

“Well, up until last year, the Phantasms were still under the school,” Yuki said.  “And the dorm was part of the seal keeping them repressed.”

“I feel like someone said that before.  How did that work?” Nina asked.

Yuki considered for a moment how to answer the question, looking as though he were counting in his head.

“When the Phantasms were first found, about a year before the construction of Duel Academia, they were in the spirit world under several layers of seal — but all of them had nearly worn away.  The spirits in charge of keeping them imprisoned were getting corrupted by the magic leaking out.”

“And so they put them under a school??” Nina said.

Yuki grimaced.

“Not the most well-thought out of ideas,” he said.  “I didn’t get all of the details myself, but the truth was, they were discovered by Mutou Yugi in the first place.”

Nina’s eyes bulged and she shot up to her knees.

“Mutou _Yugi_?” she squealed.  “The King of Games??”

“That’s the one,” Yuki said with a smile.  “Anyway, he found the cards. He and Kaiba Seto worked together to find a better place to keep them — the physical realm was a safer location, since there’s less rampant magic to irritate the seal, and its harder for even god spirits to manifest without outside help.”

He shifted to sit cross legged instead of on his knees.

“But it still wasn’t enough, so they made a new plan: they’d use the power of the Egyptian gods, their perfect counterparts, to keep them suppressed.  They replanned Duel Academia together, and built it according to an old seal design from the spirit world.”

He drew into the dirt, a circle for the school first.

“This is the center, right above where the Phantasms are, the point of confinement,” he said.  “Then here is Obelisk Blue, at the point of anchoring. Obelisk is the strongest of the gods, so it holds the foundation of the seal.”

He drew another circle, somewhat close to the school.  He drew another one a bit off to the side and at an angle.

“Ra stands at the point of observation.  It’s the god of the sun, so its light illuminates, making it impossible for the seal to be escaped without being seen.”

He drew a final circle at a more distant point, which could be none other than Osiris.

“And Osiris stands at the point of protection.  As the god with the longest reach and the guardian of the afterlife, Osiris acts as the last line of defense in the seal.  Anything that manages to escape the strength of Obelisk, or sneak past Ra, will find itself caught in Osiris’s waiting jaws.”

Nina and Taro both stared at the drawing before them.  Nina was in total awe. Who knew that there was a seal like this?  She would have thought that a seal would have everything at a perfect distance away in a circle around the thing they were trying to catch.

“But then why the school?  Why not just build shrines to the gods at those points?” Taro asked.  “That’s how we’d do it in the spirit world.”

“There’s the one big con to building in the physical world,” Yuki said with a sigh.  “Belief is a very powerful kind of magic, and in the spirit world, everyone believes in the gods, powering their shrines and their abilities.  But here, if we only built shrines, they would be empty of power. Not enough people consider the three gods, well, gods.”

“So the school was because...”

“Instead of drawing a bunch of energy towards the actual gods, what was made instead was the power of belief in the _dorms_ , as unified entities,” Yuki said.  “Adolescents especially are much more powerful at radiating this type of energy.  The students didn’t believe in the gods, but they _did_ believe in the dorms — Osiris, Ra, and Obelisk — as things that they belonged to, groups that they were a part of, and something that they put faith in as a group.”

“Brilliant,” Taro said, eyes widening.  “I’ve never heard of a more well thought seal!”

Yuki grimaced.

“Yeah, well, it only worked for so long, unfortunately.  People got drawn to them, they were unlocked once, and then once we added you guys to the mix, we had the same problem as the spirit world: too much magic irritating it.  It was the best they could do but...it still put a lot of kids in danger.”

Nina studied the diagram again.  So the Phantasms’ old home had been right under the school?  No wonder her route hadn’t been right, it had been on the other side of the school.

“But you moved them, right?” Taro said.  “If they’re somewhere else, how are they still affecting the school?”

Yuki shook his head.

“I haven’t the slightest clue,” he said, sounding tired.

They sat quietly for a moment, looking down at the diagram.  Then Nina looked back up at her teacher.

“Is there anything we can do to help?” she said.  “If something bad is happening...we can do something, right??”

Yuki blinked.  Then he smiled.  He reached out and patted her on the head.

“You kids are great,” he said.  “Listen, I’m sure the other teachers won’t like me saying this, but I’m sure you’ll get involved one way or another.  If I find out something, I’ll pass it on to the class. I won’t keep you guys in the dark.”

Nina grinned, bouncing in her seat.

“So we get to fight it??”

“Hopefully there won’t be anything to fight,” he said.  “But yes — you guys totally have my permission to fight in self defense.   _Don’t_ go looking for this stuff, at least, not without telling me first.  Are we clear?”

“Clear,” Nina and Taro echoed.

Yuki smiled again, and he looked a little less tired.

“I really do promise,” he said.  “If there’s something you guys can do?  I’ll let you know. I won’t tell you to stay back and stay safe.  I know that that’s not always feasible.”

He seemed far away for a moment, and Nina and Taro waited quietly.

“Just...promise me one thing,” he said, and his voice seemed thin and worried.

“Of course,” Nina said.

“If I ever _do_ tell you to run...run.”

A soft shiver passed through Nina.  She felt suddenly very cold.

“I promise,” she whispered.


	24. Something Wicked This Way Comes — The Secret of the Old Dorm!

“And so, for all you second-years, it’s not too early for you to be thinking about your future career paths.  I’ll want your career path forms turned in by tomorrow.”

“Man, it’s not even the end of the semester,” Taro groaned, flopping his chest against his desk as the rest of the students began to scramble for their things and head out of the lecture hall.  “And they want us to think about future plans? We’re not even third years!”

“The sooner you know, the better,” Saki said, running her hands nervously through her hair.  “I mean — there are so many colleges that look at your performance at _elementary_ school!  It’s like you need to know back then!”

“I’m just gonna go to college back home in Spain,” Nina said, yawning.  “There’s a nice pro dueling college out there that’s cheaper than the ones in Japan.  I can get by just working at my parent’s shop to pay for it.”

“I already know that I’m not going to college!” Taro said, throwing his paper into the air.  It flipped back down and struck him in the face and he let out an annoyed growl. “I’m going to be a traveling adventurer!”

“Let me guess — Chronos-sensei said you couldn’t put that on your sheet,” Minato said, sitting backwards in their chair.  

“I told him that Yuki-sensei did it when he graduated and he told me that Yuki-sensei wasn’t ‘a good role model for post-graduation activities.’”

Miu just yawned, leaning her face on the desk and looking sleepy.  She hadn’t written anything on her sheet at all, and it laid blank in front of her.  Saki, meanwhile, was rifling through huge stacks of papers and brochures that she’d dragged out of her bags.  Minato reached up to smooth her hair down.

“You’re frizzing,” they said.  “You can calm down, you know. You have until tomorrow.”

“That means I _only_ have until tomorrow to read through all of these, weigh the pros and cons, consider their costs, and decide if they’ll be good for my projected career path!”

“You know what, Saki?  I think you need to _not_ have a plan for once in your life,” Nina said, flicking her on the forehead.

Saki glowered at all of them.  Just because they had the chance to be laid back about their career options, didn’t mean she did!!

“What about you, Minato??  What did you put on your sheet?” she said.

“Huh?  Oh, nothing special,” they said, showing her the paper.

She looked it over.  All three of their choices were cheap, generic four-year universities.

“You’re not going to college for dueling?” she said with surprise.

Minato shrugged.

“I mean...I came here because it was the only high school I could get a scholarship for, and my mom wouldn’t let me drop out of school until I finished high school,” they said.  “But I don’t really know if that’s what I want to do, you know? I’m a psychic duelist...professional dueling will make me have to hold that back. I want to be able to let my monsters out to play and stretch, not force them to stay in holograms.”

As though in response, Topi popped into existence and smacked into the side of their head.  They swore at it, plucking it off of their head by the nape of its neck. They looked down and groaned, reaching down to scoop up Krus into their arms like a child.  She still had her hands hiding her face, but she sighed with something that sounded like relief when Minato cradled her.

Saki couldn’t help but smile.

“I think that’s nice,” she said.  “That’s really sweet of you.”

Minato’s cheeks darkened, and they rubbed the back of their neck once they let go of Topi, who began to zip around the empty lecture hall and shriek with excitement.  Lurrie joined it in a moment, and the two of them started wrestling in the air.

“Urghhh what I can I puuut?” Taro whined.  “Miu, what are you putting?”

Miu yawned.

“Miu doesn’t really care,” she said.  “Miu’ll do it later.”

“Hey, Taro, I know!! You could put down archaeology,” Nina said.  “That has a lot of going to different places and exploring!!”

Taro’s ears perked up with excitement.

“It’s honestly a lot more lab work,” Minato pointed out.  “It’s not like the movies.”

“It’s _not_??” Nina said.

Saki heard the squeak of a foot nearby, and looked up quickly.  If someone who wasn’t an Osiris walked in here while Minato’s monsters were flying around, and Taro had his ears and tail out —

But no, it was just Hanako.  She took the steps two at a time, swung into the aisle they had taken up, and without saying hello, grabbed Saki’s hands.

For a moment, her eyes rolled back into her head, and Saki stood up in a panic.  A vision?? Why was she having a vision all of a sudden? She couldn’t get her hands out of Hanako’s strong grip — but then Hanako’s knees buckled, and Taro dove across the desk to catch her.

Her eyes fluttered.  Her lips opened and closed.  And then finally, she was back, her eyes open and clear — but very wide with unease.

“Hanako-san?? What was that for?” Saki said.  “Are you all right?”

“S-sorry,” Hanako said, her voice shaking.  She patted Taro gratefully, and then stood up, leaning on the desk behind her for support. “It’s just — Lin-senpai and Kayoko have...and then I got another one and I needed to confirm...”

She looked pale, which was extra strange on her normally tanned skin.  

“What did you see?” Minato said, standing up.  Even Miu sat up, turning around in her seat to look curiously at Hanako.

Hanako bit her lip, looking nervous.

“I think you’d all better come meet with the rest of us,” she said.  “Something bad is definitely happening, and I think it’s happening soon.”

* * *

Lin and Kayoko weren’t the only ones in the Osiris mess hall.  All of the self-proclaimed Osiris Rangers, aka Nina’s friends from the first-years, were there too, plus the twins and Akiara.  Mylene sat on top of a table with Mi-Gyeong, who was fidgeting uncontrollably. Toitoi leaned over Kayoko, her hand across the table while Kayoko frowned and poked at her palm, muttering something.  The twins were holding up some strange, pearlescent gems for Lin to stare through in the dim light of the mess hall.

Hanako ran over and moved into Kayoko’s vision, waving to get their attention.  Kayoko looked up and nodded, and then released Toitoi and turned in their seat to check that Saki and the others were there.

“What did you see?” Kayoko said loudly to Hanako.

Hanako began to sign quickly to Kayoko, who’s eyes narrowed, and they nodded.  They looked very grim.

“What?  What?” Saki said.  “What did you see about me?”

Hanako finally turned to Saki.

“At the beginning of the year, I had a vision of the abandoned dorm on fire,” she said.  “Kayoko and Akiara-san were there.”

Akiara shuddered softly, and Eun put one arm around her and squeezed.

“There were two other people that I couldn’t place,” Hanako said.  “But the visions are coming back again, and they’re all jumbled and different.  The last one I had showed me Mylene-san and Taro-kun in the dorm instead.”

Taro and Mylene exchanged an anxious glance.

“Does that mean the future keeps changing?” Taro said, shifting from foot to foot with his ears plastered to his head.

“I think so,” Hanako said.  “But even though the people keep changing, the scenario doesn’t — there’s always at least three Osiris people in the abandoned dorm while it’s on fire.  One person is unconscious, one person is dragging them away, and one person is trying to defend them from...someone in an Obelisk uniform, in the flames.”

The room grew very quiet for a moment.  There was no sound save for the soft settling of the room.

“But why did you come see me?” Saki said.  “Am I in any of your visions?”

Hanako shook her head slowly.

“That’s just it.  I’ve seen almost everyone in Osiris dorm in this position in this vision, but a handful never showed up.  You were one of them. And then Kayoko...”

She gestured to Kayoko, signing something, and Kayoko nodded.

“I was practicing palm reading,” they said.  “I read Kaede-san’s palm earlier this morning, and learned that there was some kind of tangling of her fate line and someone else’s.  I couldn’t get the details, but it sounded like someone was planning to hurt Osiris, and Kaede-san’s line was tangled up with this person.  Kaede-san went into a frenzy and ran off.”

Kayoko shook their head.

“And then, later, Lin-senpai and I were practicing with each other.  I read Lin’s palms while they were throwing the gem dice around, and I saw...well, I saw you, Saki-senpai.  I saw you standing over someone in a blue Obelisk jacket, on the ground, while there was blue fire everywhere.  I...I can’t explain it, but it made me feel really, really scared.”

They bit their lip, eyes wide.  Saki’s heart raced. What? What kind of a vision was that?  What did that mean?

“So I ran to see you,” Hanako said.  “I thought I might be able to get a clearer reading if I used my powers directly on you.”

“And??” Saki said, her pulse bulging in her throat.

Hanako shook her head, looking scared.

“Nothing,” she said.

“What?  But you totally had a vision attack,” Minato said, leaning forward.

“And I did!  But that’s what I saw — _nothing_ ,” Hanako said, voice trembling.  “I couldn’t even see Saki. I could just see this vast, unending nothingness, and I felt this awful sense of being lost and afraid —”

She pressed her face into her hands and started to cry.  Kayoko stood up to rub her back.

“S-so what does that mean?” Saki said.  She was trembling, but the room was full of so much panic that she thought she needed to try and stay calm.

“I don’t know,” Hanako said.  “I really have no idea.”

“You said you guys thought something bad was about to happen.  Do you think the abandoned dorm fire is going to happen soon?” Minato said.

“We need to warn everyone to stay out of the abandoned dorm!” Nina said, eyes wide.  “And tell Yuki-sensei and Andersen-sensei!”

“I don’t know where they are,” Mylene said, shaking xir head.  “We went to both of their rooms before we went to get you, and they’re not there.”

Think, Saki, think!  Oh, no, she was panicking.  She needed to breathe!!

Minato’s hand dropped onto her shoulder, and Miu grabbed her other hand, squeezing it.  The touches were enough to drag her back to herself.

“Okay, we can’t panic,” she said.  “First, we need to tell the whole dorm of the danger.  Two or three people need to work on getting messages out through the pagers.”

“I’ve got that!” Nina said.

“Me too!” said Mi-Gyeong, already texting.

Okay, okay, what was the next step?  Saki looked around the room, trying to think.

“Everyone with a spirit partner, send them to look for Yuki-sensei and Andersen-sensei, or any of the Osiris teachers,” she said.  “They should either come here, or maybe go straight to the dorm, to make sure no one goes in.”

“On it,” Minato said, whistling for their spirits.

Angel had already heard her, and he darted off immediately.

“Oracles, you guys stay here; don’t push yourselves, but keep seeing how many details you can come up with,” Saki said.  “Ji-U, Eun, Akiara, will you two stay here just in case they need protection?”

“We’ve got it,” Ji-U said, sending her the OK sign.

Okay, now what??  Think, Saki, think.  Keep it all organized!  What else needs to be dealt with?

She remembered with a start something else that Kayoko had said.  She turned towards them — she was awful at the little sign language she knew, so she just spoke as clearly as she could.

“You said Kaede was here?” she said.  “Where did she go?”

* * *

“Fuck, fuck, fuck.  Hinata, breathe. You need to breathe.”

Judai had to hold Hinata down on the ground by her shoulders.  The girl’s skin was bone white, almost gray, and her eyes were washing out of color too as they bulged.  She kept screaming, not stopping until she needed to take a harsh, ripping breath.

Saya was clearly trying not to, but she was sobbing, and Johan held onto her, holding her steady as he watched with a pale face.  Judai swore as Hinata flailed and kicked again. She was going to bite off her tongue at this rate! How long had this attack been going this time?

“Johan, I’m going to need your help,” he grunted.  “This might not work, but we need to try something.”

“What are you going to do?” Saya gasped, as Johan squeezed her shoulders, and stepped forward to grab Judai’s hand.

“Ethereal alchemy,” Judai said, inhaling sharply.  “Hinata’s soul is completely out of balance — the best I can do is hopefully use some of Johan’s essence to stabilize her.”

“Adding someone else’s essence to her is dangerous,” Johan said, tightening his grip on Judai’s hand.  “She might reject it.”

“I don’t know what else to do!  At this rate she could die!” Judai said, his voice cracking.

Hinata screamed again, her body flailing — for a moment, her edges seemed to glow and warp and stretch, and Judai swore.

“She’s going to fall back into another dimension again, we need to try this, Johan!”

Hinata’s hand reached up and grabbed Judai by the collar, dragging him down with a strength that her thin body shouldn’t possess.

“It’s watching me,” Hinata gasped.  “It’s watching them, it’s watching them, it wants...it wants...it’s watching, it’s always watching, it’s _here_ , it never _left_ —”

“Hinata, breathe, breathe, breathe,” Judai said.  “Johan, please.”

Johan’s face was so white, but he nodded.  He held Judai’s hand, and let Judai filter out some of Johan’s essence, copying it to himself for a moment.  Johan had one of the purest souls Judai had ever encountered — his very essence was the antithesis of corruption.  Yubel had had to completely extract his soul from his body in order to use his body, because with their unbalanced, Light-scarred soul at the time, Johan’s soul had been like an extremely powerful insect repellent.  If Judai could do this right, and copy part of Johan’s essence into Hinata, weaving it into her soul, he might be able to give her the spiritual antibodies she needed to break the control of whatever held her.

On the other hand, her soul could also reject Johan’s essence with such force that it shattered.

Judai finished making the copy, and filtered the essence he’d borrowed back into Johan, releasing his hand.  He pulled the copy to his fingers, and pressed his hand lightly against Hinata’s chest. Bit by bit, he filtered the essence into the anchor of her soul.  Carefully, carefully...

_Judai, be careful, she’s starting to fight it._

Hinata screamed again, and her soul lurched.  Judai swore as what he’d woven already unraveled.

“No, she’s not the one fighting — it’s whatever’s left in her soul,” Judai said.  “It’s like a virus. Yubel, help me.”

Yubel complied, stretching their influence to his arms in order to help him steady himself.  He went back to working the soul into Hinata’s. Hinata screamed, and her soul lurched and shied away in turns, but this time Judai was winning.  Just a little more...a little more —

Almost as quickly as it had begun, the attack ended.  Hinata’s whole body went limp, she stopped screaming, and her head lolled to the side.  Saya screamed.

“It’s okay, Saya, it’s okay,” Johan reassured her.  “She’s breathing. She’s still breathing.”

The copy of Johan’s essence naturally broke apart and faded away from Judai’s grip as the soul beneath it went briefly limp.  Judai swore.

That hadn’t been natural.  Whatever had grip of Hinata had realized what Judai was doing and let go of Hinata in an instant, so as not to let itself be removed.  Now that the attack was over, Judai couldn’t sense the problems in Hinata’s soul. Dammit!! There was no way that whoever did this could be this smart!

“Judai, one of the students’ spirits just showed up.  I think it wants us to come back to the dorm.”

Judai shot straight up, eyes widening with panic.  What _now_?

* * *

Ever since midterms, Kaede had been having nightmares.

Most of them, she didn’t remember, but she would wake up in a cold sweat and trying not to scream, for fear of waking up Saki and Miu.  She felt like she was imposing on them enough, with them letting her stay in their room after her fight with Fumino. She didn’t want to wake them up in the middle of the night, too.

Lately, however, the nightmares had been getting clearer.  She’d see Kylie, sneering at her. She thought they must be stress nightmares, from that time that Kylie had confronted her about the secret of the Osiris dorm.

But they’d gotten more detailed.  She’d seen Kylie and Saki fighting, maybe dueling.  Then she'd see Kylie throwing envelopes into a fire behind the Obelisk dorm.  Kylie pulling books out of the library and poring over maps of the school. Kylie skulking around the abandoned dorm.  They were weird, random things to have dreams about, she’d thought.

At least, until she’d actually run into Kylie in the library, looking at the exact same book Kaede had dreamed about her reading.

She didn’t have powers.  She would have been in Osiris to begin with if she had.  But then what were these weird dreams? What was going on?

Then she’d agreed to let Kayoko practice palm reading on her.  And Kayoko had told her that she was tangled up with someone who wanted to hurt Osiris, and all Kaede could think about were her constant dreams about Kylie.

She needed to do something.

Kaede stormed straight to the Obelisk dorm, shivering at the cool autumn air.  She let herself in through the big front doors, and immediately ran into an Obelisk girl.  The girl looked her up and down and raised an eyebrow.

“Are you lost?” she asked.

“I need to talk to Kylie Harbison,” Kaede said, with a confidence she didn’t feel.  “Can you tell me where she is?”

“Kylie?  Oh, she left a while ago, I think.”

Kaede’s heart raced.

“Which way did she go?”

The girl hadn’t known, but had given her a vague direction, so Kaede went off in that direction.  The sky was getting darker much earlier, now, and by the time she hit the trees, it was almost too hard to see beneath them.  Too nervous to go into the woods themselves, Kaede made her way along the side, looking for signs of Kylie.

She found one on the path that led towards the abandoned dorm.  A footprint, leading that direction. Kaede bit her lip.

She should probably call someone, right?  Tell them what she was doing?

But what if it was too late?

She started down the path.  It was really getting dark by the time she made it to the dorm, and it looked spooky and looming above her.  She swallowed. Okay, if she didn’t see Kylie around, like in her dream, she’d turn around and tell people what she thought she might knew.  Otherwise...

She heard something fall and crash inside the dorm.  Her heart leaped into her throat. Without thinking about it, she bolted towards the door.  It was already hanging open, and she let herself in.

“Hello??  Are you okay?” she shouted.

No answer.  The silence seemed somehow taken aback.  Her words simply hung like the dust that had been stirred by her entry.  Ugh, but it was creepy in here. It looked like a smaller version of the Obelisk dorm, with a big staircase in the middle, two wings on either side, and some doors along the back wall.  One of those doors was open.

Heart screaming, Kaede edged towards the door.  

“Hello?” she called softly.

She fumbled for her pager.  Now was a good time to call someone over here, like Saki.  She misdialed twice as she approached the door, and peeked down the stairs.  

There was...there was a light on down there.  Something flickering, like a torch. Was someone down there?  Had that crash meant that they were hurt? She leaned forward just a bit.

“Snooping is rude,” a familiar voice hissed from behind her.

She screamed, and tried to spin around, but there was already a hand on her back, shoving her headfirst down the stairs.  She screamed again as the world began to tumble around her, and braced herself for the strike at the bottom of the stairs.

It never came.

Instead, there was only an eerie, ringing nothingness.


	25. The Disappearing Act —  Kaede’s Missing??

Saki ran along the path, trying to figure out where Kaede might have gone.  She left in a frenzy after Kayoko’s reading, right? Why would she have done that? Unless she had some kind of idea of what Kayoko meant?  She had to think. What might Kaede think about knowing she was involved with someone who wanted to hurt Osiris?

_“She stopped me on my way out.  Tried to ask me weird questions about Osiris.  Like...she has suspicions, maybe?”_

That’s right!!  Kaede had mentioned that Kylie had been harassing her about Osiris.  And Kylie had been the ringleader of the war against Osiris.  Saki changed course to run towards Obelisk. Kaede had probably gone right over to confront her.  Dammit, Kaede!! Why did she have to do things all by herself?

She was out of breath by the time she reached Obelisk, pausing near the door to rest a hand against the wall.  Had Kaede already gone inside? Was she fighting with Kylie? Oh please let her be okay.

Saki opened the doors and slipped into the Obelisk lobby.  There was an Obelisk girl sitting on the front step, looking at a book. She looked up at the sound of Saki walking in, and raised her eyebrows.

“Are _you_ lost too?” she said.

Saki’s heart jumped into her chest.

“What do you mean, ‘too’?  Has another non-Obelisk been here?  Have you seen a Ra come in?”

The girl opened her mouth, looking annoyed, and then stopped.  She frowned.

“I thought I did,” she said.  “Huh. I can’t remember now.”

She shrugged.

“How can you not remember??” Saki said, leaning forward.  “How long ago was it? Where did she go?”

“Look, I don’t know. Leave me alone.”

The girl rolled her eyes, and went back to her book.  Saki could hardly breathe now.

“What about Kylie Harbison?  Have you seen her?”

“Didn’t you ask me that already?”

“Huh?”

The girl looked very confused for a moment, and then shook her head, glowering.

“Look, I don’t know, I’m not her secretary.  But she’s not here. I saw her leave a while ago.”

Saki couldn’t breathe.  She nodded and mumbled a quick thank you, and then bolted back out into the autumn chill.  She dug her pager from her pocket and flicked through it as she headed towards Ra. Maybe Kaede _hadn’t_ gone after Kylie?  Maybe she’d gone to see her old roommate?  She headed towards Ra as she looked through her contacts.

Huh?  Where was Kaede’s pager?  She should have it. All of the student’s pagers were in here.  Maybe she’d skipped it. She checked again. No...Hisakawa Kaede wasn’t there.  A glitch, probably. She put the pager away and went for her cell phone instead.  She definitely had Kaede’s number.

But as she flipped through it several times, she couldn’t find it.  What the heck?? Had someone messed with her phone? She couldn’t even find her as any of the dumb nicknames she would change herself to when she stole Saki’s phone.  Ugh! She must have deleted it by accident or something! Irritated and just a little panicky, Saki stuffed the phone back into her pocket and hurried on to Ra Yellow.

The door to the lobby was open, and she hurried in.  A few people were gathered around tables in the lounge, some in their plain clothes, but everyone looked a little surprised to see her red jacket.  She ignored them and climbed the stairs. She remembered which room was Kaede’s already.

She jumped up to the second floor, ran down the hall, and skidded to a stop, almost missing the door.  She knocked, trying not to sound panicky or knock too much. It seemed like forever before someone finally answered.

Kaede’s old roommate, Fumino, appeared at the door.  Saki had only met her in passing once when she’d come over to visit with Kaede, but she looked the same as ever — taller than Saki, with toned arms, and pixie-cut black hair that was falling over her eyes without her usual bobby pins.

“I know, I’m sorry, you probably don’t want to see me, but is Kaede here? Have you seen her recently?”

Fumino just stared at her for a moment.  She glanced up and down the hallway, frowning.

“Sorry,” she said.  “Do you have the wrong room?”

Saki blinked.

“What?  No, I — I know Kaede hasn’t been here for a while, but...”

“Okay, back up,” Fumino said, holding up one hand.  “Sorry, I just don’t think we’ve met, and I’m pretty confused.  So start with, who’s Kaede?”

Saki felt something like ice creeping through her legs and up into her throat.  For a moment, all she could do was stare. She couldn’t even breathe. She almost choked before she gasped for air again.

“Kaede?  Your roommate?” Saki said.  “I-if this is a joke, Hattori-san, it’s not very funny.”

Fumino looked legitimately confused.  Her lips parted when Saki said _roommate_ , but then she shook her head, squinting at nothing.

“I’ve been in a single all year,” she said, but part of it sounded like a question, like that knowledge was surprising to her too.  “Sorry. Uh. I hope you find your friend.”

She hesitated a moment longer, and then awkwardly closed the door.  Saki just stood there, staring at it. Her hands shook. She glanced at the door placard, hoping against hope for something to be there — but no.  Only Fumino’s name was by the door. There was an empty space where Kaede’s should be.

Her phone and her pager were empty of Kaede’s information.  Fumino didn’t remember her. It was clear that Kaede had been to Obelisk, but the Obelisk girl had forgotten she was there almost halfway through their conversation.

What...what was going on?

Her pager rang in her pocket.  Numbly, she pulled it out. It was a message from Minato.

_Come back to the dorm.  Yuki-sensei and Andersen-sensei are here. Bring Kaede._

Saki almost cried seeing Kaede’s name.  Minato still remembered Kaede! She wasn’t going crazy!  

She bolted from the door immediately, sending a message back.

_Kaede is missing.  I don’t know what’s going on.  Nobody remembers her._

* * *

Saki burst back into the mess hall, chilled from the outside breeze.  Yuki-sensei was already right there at the door, and he caught her by the shoulders before she could collapse.

“Kaede!” she gasped.  “Kaede’s gone!”

“It’s okay, Saki, we heard,” he said, squeezing her shoulders.  “We’re going to do something about it. Don’t worry.”

His voice was calm and smooth, and Saki clung to the sound, trying to breathe normally.  He released her, and Taro jumped forward to help guide her to a table. The whole of Osiris was stuffed into the mess hall — even Haruka was in the back corner, looking sour and uncomfortable.  Most of the teachers were present, too — it was a tight squeeze. Oh, Saki saw with surprise. Saya and Hinata were there too, with an exhausted looking Hinata leaning against Saya while Saya softly rubbed her arm.

Andersen clapped his hands for attention at the chatter that was going through the room, and it slowly quieted.  He glanced over the group.

“Everyone,” he said.  “It looks like something’s definitely going on around campus.  I know a lot of you have already heard from your friends about their visions, and heard about the missing student from Ra.”

A few more whispers echoed through the room, and Andersen clapped his hands again for attention.

“We don’t know the cause, but all of the visions point to the abandoned dorm being the source,” he said.  “With that in mind, there is one rule that you all _cannot_ break.  You cannot go into the abandoned dorm, and stay out of its surrounding area.  The teachers are going to be investigating there.”

Yuki leaned forward then.

“But before you all start shouting about us not letting you do anything,” he said.  “We’re not telling you just to stay put and hide. Anyone who wants to help: we’re going to be putting together some squads to search the rest of the island.”

Hands shot up before he even asked for volunteers, and after a beat, almost the entire room was holding their hands up.  Saki threw hers up immediately, and beside her, so did Minato, Taro, Nina, and Miu. Yuki held up his hands.

“Hang on, hang on.  A few more rules before we get started, okay?  Outside your squad, don’t go anywhere on campus by yourself.  Try to encourage everyone you know in the other dorms to stay in groups as well — we don’t want to cause a panic, of course, but there’s safety in numbers.”

“If you are not with your squad out late for some reason, curfew is a very strict seven pm,” Saiou said.  “I know it’s not fun. But the more we keep everyone together, the safer it will be.”

Everyone mumbled an agreement.  The idea of being allowed to join squads to try and track down whatever was kidnapping everyone seemed to be assuaging those who might otherwise sneak out.

“And finally, if you see anything strange, _do not_ investigate it yourself.  Contact a teacher _immediately_ for back up,” Yuki said.  

“Also, don’t forget,” Dawn said, hopping up and down.  “If you mention someone or something to someone else that they should remember, and it seems they’ve forgotten?  Tell us right away.”

“It seems that whatever has struck here is attacking memories,” said Tania.  “It looks like all you kids are so far immune, probably because your souls are better trained.”

“But it could spread, depending on how powerful this thing is.  So if someone in this room forgets Kaede, or another student, you tell us immediately,” said Andersen.  “We need to know how fast this spreads.”

“With that being said, everyone who wants in on a squad, raise your hands.  We’re going to start distributing duties,” said Misawa, lifting up a clip board.

All the hands shot up again.  Misawa started counting off students, writing down names, and then assigning them to teachers’ groups.  Saki waited with her hands in her lap, and her throat tight.

_Kaede.  I promise I’m going to find you, no matter what._


	26. The Disappearing Act, Pt 2 — Kakon’s Theory

Disappear.

Just disappear.

_ Disappear! _

It hurts.  It really hurts.  But this is what it takes.  They wouldn’t disappear like they were supposed to, like they would have if they had just been quiet and hadn’t fought back and had just left the school like they were supposed to.  They didn’t belong. They shouldn’t be here! But the refuse to disappear!

So  _ make  _ them disappear.

* * *

“I think it’s stupid,” Keiko grumbled.  “Why do we have to go everywhere with a partner?”

“It’s dangerous out here right now, Keiko-chan,” said Harue.  “We don’t know why Hisakawa-san disappeared.”

“But I don’t wanna sit here and play chess anymore,” Keiko whined.  “Can’t we go get some snacks?”

The lounge was pretty quiet today.  It was getting colder, and people were staying in their rooms more often than not.  Keiko moped, resting her face in her hands and smushing her cheeks. Harue had caught her on the way out of her room to sneak off to play games, and had insisted on coming with her.  It was annoying to just play the one arcade machine in the lounge with someone watching her, so she’d agreed to play chess, but she hated chess. It was stupid, and Harue wouldn’t let her win.  It was like he was immune to her charms, which was the worst type of person to hang out with.

“Let’s finish this game, and then we’ll go to the snack shop,” Harue said.  He rubbed his chin, frowning at the board, and then after an agonizingly long time, he finally moved a piece.

Keiko moaned, putting her face into her hands.

“I’m bored!” she said, in the most annoying voice she could manage.  “I don’t wanna play anymore, Harue-oniichan.”

She stood up, and Harue looked at her sharply.  He started to stand up, and she groaned.

“I’m going to the  _ bathroom _ ,” she said.  “Unless you wanna follow me in there, too?”

His cheeks darkened, and he quickly sat back down.

“Don’t sneak off by yourself, okay?  This is just for safety.”

“Fiiine,” she moaned.

She skipped out of the lounge and down to the bathroom.  Normally, she would have used this opportunity to run off and do what she wanted, but...Harue really did seem upset and nervous, and if she was honest, so was she.  Someone had just  _ disappeared _ .  And everyone forgot her?  What a weird school. Maybe she shouldn’t have come.

She used the bathroom quickly, and then jumped to the sink to wash her hands.  She hummed a little song to herself to measure how long it took to wash her hands hands, like her oldest brother had taught her.  Her eyes flicked up towards the mirror. Someone had just come out of another stall. Hang on — wasn’t that...?

Keiko started to open her mouth when something cold seemed to scoop her up, and then she didn’t see anything at all.

* * *

“See anything weird?” Mostyn asked.

Anani shook her head, dropping the branches she’d pulled back.

“It looks pretty quiet out here,” she said.  “We should go back and meet up at the rendezvous with Saiou-sensei.”

Mostyn nodded slowly, still staring out into the darkening woods.  His face had half melted and turned green, and there was a horn poking out of his forehead, but he shook his head and his face snapped back to normal.

“Yeah,” he said.  “Let’s go.”

Anani blinked, tilting her head.

“Did you see something?” she said.

“No, not really.  I just have this feeling, you know?”

He shivered, and for a moment, his skin turned bumpy and blue before he shook it back to normal.  He rubbed his arms. Then he reached out and grabbed Anani’s hand.

“You’re right, we should go back,” he said.  “We’ve gotten kinda far out of our search radius anyway.”

_ He must be really rattled _ , Anani thought.   _ His hands keep shifting. _

Mostyn had gotten much better at holding a solid shape since last year, but now he was clearly nervous.  Although he kept a grip on Anani’s hand, his hand kept getting longer fingers, or turning as solid as concrete, or getting slippery to hold.

It was all right, they were almost back to the point where Saiou was waiting.  They’d make it back fine. She tried to squeeze Mostyn’s hand to reassure him that it was going to be okay.

She heard something rustle behind her.  She glanced back. Was something moving in the shadows?  Oh, no, that was just a squirrel. She shook her head, and looked forward again.  They were just about back into the clearing where Saiou was waiting, keeping an eye on things with his fortune-telling.

Mostyn pushed a branch away from the path, and there was Saiou and the others in their group.  Mostyn started to wave. Anani blinked as she saw something in front of them seem to sort of waver like a mirage, or a heat pocket.  She tried to pull back on Mostyn’s hand, but he’d already stepped forward, and she’d gone with him.

They stepped  _ into _ something, like stepping into a sideways puddle of freezing water, and then she saw nothing at all.

* * *

Saki stared at the book in front of her, but she wasn’t reading it.  Underneath it was a paper that had a big red twenty written on it, and a short note from one of her teachers asking her if she was doing all right, because she never bombed tests like this.  But how could she focus on homework when Kaede was missing?

Minato wasn’t studying either.  They were tossing a bean bag back and forth in their hands, staring at the library ceiling, a stack of untouched books beside them.  They’d both gone through the motions of tracking down the books they needed, but only Saki had opened one, and even she hadn’t done any work on the paper they were supposed to be writing.

“They’ll find Kaede, right?” Saki whispered.

“If anyone can, Yuki-sensei and Andersen-sensei definitely will,” Minato said.

“What if she’s lost in another dimension, like Hinata-san?” Saki mumbled, blinking back tears.  “She doesn’t have any powers — she doesn’t know what to do! What if —”

“Hey, hey,” Minato said, putting an arm around her shoulder and letting her lean on them.  “Breathe. It’s all going to work out. Remember, we’re on a patrol with Tania-sensei tonight, so we’ll look for her too.”

“Right...”

Saki tried not to cry.  She’d been doing nothing but crying for the past few days.

“Hey, guys. What’s with the long faces?”

Saki startled, sitting straight up.  Kakon had appeared from an aisle with a couple of books under his arms.  He smiled to see Saki and Minato, and Saki relaxed as she saw who it was.

“Oh, hi, Kakon-senpai,” she said, quickly wiping at her eyes.  “It’s nothing. Just stress, you know?”

“Ah, yeah, I get that,” Kakon said.  “I’ve got this huge paper to write in a couple of days, so I feel.”

He plopped down across the table from the two of them, dropping his books and flopping back in his seat.

“Urgh.  This weather’s no good either, huh?” he said, sending them both a lopsided grin.  

Saki tried to smile back, and even Minato attempted a grimace, but it was hard to even fake it.  Kakon raised his eyebrows, and then leaned forward across the table.

“Okay, I have a feeling this is about a lot more than just school stuff,” he said.  “So what’s up? Anything your senpai can help out with?”

Saki and Minato exchanged a glance.  There wasn’t really anything they could tell him without sharing the secret of the Osiris Dorm.  And Yuki-sensei had asked them to keep things on the down low for now to not spread panic.

“I...it’s just Kylie-san again,” Saki said slowly. “We’re having a little bit of hazing trouble again, that’s all.  It’s exhausting, but nothing we can’t handle.”

“Ahh,” Kakon said, nodding.  “Yeah, I know about Kylie. She’s a piece of work, that one.  But real smart, and real talented. Comes from a big family of huge talent.”

“Do you know why she’s so wrapped up in attacking Osiris?” Minato said, clearly grabbing onto the conversation to keep it going, and drive it away from the truth.  “I mean, there must be a reason.” 

Kakon shrugged.

“Well, she’s always been pretty elitist.  Went to all the best schools, I heard. And you know, her family’s the Harbisons.  You heard of them?”

Saki and Minato both shook their heads.

“Huuge in England.  Her parents were both pro duelists before they got married, and the dad went into running the leagues himself while the mom’s the PR lawyer for it.  Both of her older brothers have been national champions at one point, and both of them have taken a crack at the international title.”

Saki inhaled.

“I had no idea,” she breathed.  “That...must be a lot to live up to.”

“Doesn’t give her the right to take it out on us,” Minato grumbled.

Kakon cracked a smile.

“Definitely not.  But I guess that’s the only thing she could think of.  She’s always had to be the best, and now the people she’s looked down on are showing her up.  Must’ve rattled her.”

He sighed, looking back up at the ceiling.

“I’ll bet she’s actually pretty lonely,” he said.  “You know, I heard after the whole Osiris versus Obelisk thing, a lot of her friends — if you can call them friends — kinda dropped her.  Must be lonely trying to be at the top.”

Saki looked up at him, clasping her hands in her lap.  She furrowed her brow.

“Do you...know her well?” she asked.

“Me?  Nah. She’s a year younger than me and we don’t really cross paths.”

“Sounds like you know quite a bit,” said Minato. 

“Ah, you know.  The people who make a name for themselves get plenty of gossip strewn around,” he said, waving a hand.  “I try to avoid all that. Not many people in Obelisk could tell you who I am.”

He chuckled, and Saki did manage a little smile at that.

“You’re not like most Obelisks,” she said.

“God, I hope not,” he said, laughing.  “Wouldn’t want to be anything like Obelisk.  Kind of a...a bunch of pricks.”

Saki was feeling surprisingly a little bit better, just talking to someone.  She needed this kind of distraction. Just for a few minutes, at least.

Although...all this talk about Kylie...

Kaede had...gone to look for Kylie before she’d disappeared, right?  Where was Kylie now? Despite their lie, Saki actually hadn’t seen her.  Had...had she disappeared too?? No, but Kakon was talking about her, Kakon remembered her, so she couldn’t have disappeared like Kaede, right?  Still, she should contact Yuki-sensei about it. She pretended to get a message on her pager, and then began to type something out to Yuki-sensei.

“Oh, not to change the subject, either,” Kakon said, distracting Saki in the middle of her message.  “But I’ve been seeing this Ra girl lurk around the back of the library lately? Never close enough to see her, but she keeps pulling books out of the shelves and leaving them all over the floor.”

“And?” Minato said, frowning.  Saki looked up too, confused as to what this had to do with anything.

“Well, I just thought she looked kinda like that friend of yours.  Kaede, right? I mean, not that I really know what she looks like, I’ve only seen a couple pictures you’ve shown me.  I guess I just thought maybe you’d have an idea.”

Saki could not stop the ice from bursting through her.  A billion thoughts assaulted her — Kakon had seen someone like Kaede. Kakon  _ remembered _ Kaede.  Kaede might have been here in the library?  Books? Why would she be pulling out books?

She looked sharply at Minato, who looked back at her with wide eyes.  Almost at the same time, they stood up, making Kakon blink with surprise.

“Where did you see her?” Saki gasped.  “Where was she pulling out books??”


	27. The Plot of Armityle — Haruka and Saki’s Disappearance!

“Judai.  I’m about to have another attack.”

Judai shot to his feet.  Hinata looked calm enough at the other side of the table, but she was clearly pale, her eyes surrounded by dark circles, and her hands were starting to shake against the top of the table.  Judai rounded the chairs to grab gentle hold of her shoulders, helping her move to the floor in case she fell. She was starting to shake even more, now, a faint rattling sound escaping her throat.  She put a hand over her mouth to still it.

“Hinata, it’s okay, you don’t have to fight it, just let it pass,” Judai said, gripping her hand tightly.

Hinata shook her head.

“No, I can tell, this one is bad.”

She sucked in a heavy, rattling breath.  Her hand squeezed Judai’s.

“I need you to follow it this time.  Figure out what’s causing it.”

Judai shook his head quickly, and Yubel let out a nervous hiss in his mind.

“I can’t.  Every time I’ve tried, it seems like it’s getting ready to kill you to stop me from looking.”

“I don’t care,” Hinata hissed.  “You need to figure it out. The worse they get, I think the closer it’s coming.  It’s using me as an opening, don’t you understand?”

Her voice was starting to break and crack like it did on the edge of an attack.  Judai helped her lay down, holding her head against his knees in case she started to flail.

“Still, I won’t let it kill you,” Judai said.

Hinata reached up and grasped his hand.

“Judai, please,” she begged.  “I can feel it. It’s looking, it’s everywhere, it’s still watching me, and now it’s watching them too; it’s taken them all away from here and it’s watching, always watching, you have to get them out before they turn out like me, before it infects them — ”

She wasn’t making any sense, it was just another babbling from her attacks — but something about it was resonating with Judai.  She was — she was onto something. Oh. Oh shit, if whatever had hold of her was using her to look at Duel Academia, then what if...what if she was seeing it back??

“Breathe, Hinata, breathe,” he instructed, grasping her hand tightly.  “Don’t push it.”

He looked up nervously towards the other door.  Johan and Saya should be outside, but why weren’t they coming back in?  They must have heard the noise, right?

“Johan!  Saya!” he shouted.  “Hinata’s having another attack!”

There was no answer.  His heart rose into his throat.

“It has them,” Hinata mumbled.  “The traps are everywhere, they’ve laid them everywhere — ”

Oh god.  No, that couldn’t be right.  Johan and Saya — had they disappeared, too, like some of the other students?  Judai’s heart rose into his throat, and then he forced it back down.

_ If Johan’s gone to where the kids are, that’s better,  _ Yubel thought at him.   _ Johan can help them from the other side.  Focus on Hinata at the moment. _

“Johan!  Saya!” Judai called one more time, just to make sure that they were there and hadn’t heard him.  He swore and grabbed for his phone. Saki said that Kaede had disappeared from her phone contacts when she disappeared, and Keiko’s, Anani’s, and Mostyn’s numbers had each vanished from the pagers when they’d gone missing too.  He took only a moment to confirm — Johan was gone from his phone.  _ Shit! _

But Yubel was right, if Johan had been taken, he’d be able to do more for the other taken students, provided they’d all gone to the same place...no, he couldn’t think about that.  He needed to focus on Hinata right now. He needed to trust that Johan could take care of himself.

“Hinata, what do you need me to do?” Judai said, trying to keep his voice calm.  “What do you need?”

Hinata squeezed his hand so tightly that he thought she’d break his bones.

“Even if it looks like it’s going to kill me, you need to follow the thread,” she gasped.  “You need to learn what it’s planning.”

She asked of him the one thing he couldn’t let himself do.  It was his own fault, one way or another, that she’d been trapped in the other world for so long.  His own darkness that had caused the genocide in Dark World that had driven her into whatever trap Armityle had laid for her.  And his own incompetence that had let her be trapped for so long despite his best efforts. And now she wanted him to continue to cause her pain?

“Judai,” she gasped.  Tears squeezed out of her eyes.  “Please. Saya’s gone. And I can’t see where she is.  Please, you have to save her, and everyone.”

_ Judai.  She’s asking you to.  You need to respect her wishes _ , Yubel said.

Judai almost drew blood biting his lip.  Then he groaned.

“Okay,” he said.  “Hinata, just...keep breathing.”

He gripped both of her hands, and bent over so that his forehead was near hers, closing his eyes.  He could sense it clearly, now, the writhing, dried brown thing that clutched at her soul. Every time he’d tried to follow the source before, it had seemed to try and stop her heart.  This time...he would have to follow it, no matter what.

He mentally gripped hold of the thread of the thing, and started to follow it.  It went deep into Hinata’s soul, like a root system — and then it spread outward, down towards something else, like it was rooted into the very earth of Duel Academia.  The thing in Hinata’s soul started to flail, started to squeeze on her heart. He wanted to pull back — Yubel wouldn’t let him. They pushed hard on him, shoving him forwards into the root system.  Soon, he was so deep in it that without Yubel’s hand somewhere on his spiritual self, he probably wouldn’t know how to get back.

Follow it.  He had to find where it was coming from.

The roots went deep, deep into Duel Academia.  They were  _ everywhere _ .   And there were seeds, too; big pulsating things where the roots met.  They weren’t real, he reminded himself. They were just the form that the magic was taking in his mind’s eye.  He followed the roots further. Hinata seemed to be the major source — like the cutting of a plant. But there were other seeds, others that seemed to have been planted elsewhere by someone else, and the roots had connected to Hinata’s.  Was  _ this _ why her attacks had been getting worse?  Not because she was getting worse, but because someone else was planting the same magic into Duel Academia!

And these seeds — every place they were planted was at the same place that someone had disappeared!  This was the woods where Saiou had seen Anani and Mostyn disappear right in front of him. This was the bathroom where Keiko had vanished.  There was another right outside Hinata and Saya’s house, where Johan and Saya must have fallen through. And what about Kaede? Where had she vanished?  

He felt sick.  There were so many of these seeds all over campus.  Were the missing people  _ inside _ the seeds, or had the seeds simply acted as portals?  And who had created them?

The root system tangled most fiercely beneath the abandoned dorm.  There were almost ten or fifteen seeds alone beneath the dorm. In fact, this seemed like it must be the origin of the seeds!  He would find who had been planting them there, he was sure of it!

He followed them back, trying to come back to Hinata.  But Hinata had said she wanted him to figure out what it was planning...was this in fact Armityle’s work?  It would make sense — it could influence Duel Academia even from its new location if it had a cutting of itself inside Hinata.  But this was just so well-thought out for a creature he’d thought to be mad and unstable. Had...had he underestimated the Phantasms?

He was almost back to where Hinata was.  He’d have to discuss this with Yubel, and then head to the abandoned dorm to try and deal with this.  He could get rid of all of the cuttings of Armityle then, and hopefully save Hinata and all of the missing students!

He was almost back.  But another thick root system caught his attention. Where was this in relation to the rest of the school?  It took him a few moments to figure it out. 

Then he felt very cold.  The library. This was right underneath the library.  And just beneath that...was the old cavern that had once held the Phantasms.

_ It’s still there, _ he thought with a panic.   _ The Phantasms are still there, in the cuttings of their magic!  I didn’t remove them all from inside the cavern!! No wonder they haven’t tried to break out of their new seal! _

He shot back to Hinata.  The library — he had to go there first!  There could be students in there!

He snapped back into his body, gasping for breath.  Hinata was still gasping and flailing, still babbling.  She was still in the throes of her attack — but she was alive.  He’d been allowed to look for the source this time — and that terrified him.  Did Armityle no longer care if he knew where it was working?

Before he could grab his phone and call the teachers, Hinata grabbed his collar, and yanked him back down towards him.

“Not supposed to be here,” she gasped.  “Someone’s here who’s not supposed to be here.”

* * *

Kakon had said that he’d seen Kaede back here most often.  Saki peered at the books, trying to see if she could figure out a pattern.  This the biology section, and nothing looked out of order right now. But why would she have been pulling out random books?  She was missing, and she was in the library doing...this?

“See anything?” Saki asked.

Minato shook their head.  They pulled out a random book and flipped through it.

“No,” they said.  “This doesn’t make any sense.”

“I know!” Saki said.  “Like, for one thing, how does Kakon-senpai remember Kaede?”

Minato’s eyes narrowed.  They licked their lips. Over their head, Topi appeared and landed on top of them, pushing their hat over their eyes.  Almost absently, they reached up and plucked Topi off by the back of its collar, letting it squirm and flail while they fixed their hat.

“I’ll keep looking,” they said.  “You go ask Kakon-senpai what else he remembers.”

Saki nodded.  Kakon had said he’d go with them to look at the area he’d indicated, but they’d made some excuse not to bother him — they just didn’t want him to be around if something magical happened that they weren’t equipped to handle.

Saki darted back through the books to the table where they’d left Kakon with his homework.  How would she go about asking this without sounding suspicious? Without telling him the truth, that Kaede was missing?

She rounded the last aisle, and stopped in her tracks.

Kakon was no longer at the table.  But Haruka was.

Haruka stood awkwardly at the table, looking up and down it, holding her pager in one hand.  She looked up, and her eyes widened when she saw Saki. Then they narrowed again, and she looked like she was about to start snarling.

“What’s the deal?” she said, thrusting her pager towards Saki. 

Saki was so shocked that she couldn’t say anything for a moment.  Then she shook herself awake and glowered.

“What do you mean, what’s the deal?” she said.  “What are you doing here? And why are you by yourself??  The teachers told us not to go anywhere by ourselves!”

“What the hell?  You’re the one who told me to come by myself!” Haruka said, bristling.

Saki’s irritation faltered as she stared at her.

“What are you talking about?” she said.

“Don’t play dumb after sending me a message like that!”

Message?  Oh, was that why she was waving her pager around?  Saki felt at her pockets for her own pager. Oh? Where had it gone?  

Her eyes flicked over the table, and her lips parted.  There was her pager, sitting where she had left it with her open books.  

“I didn’t send you a message,” she said quietly, feeling a faint tremble go up her arms.

“That’s likely!” Haruka snapped.

Haruka advanced around the table until she was nearly face to face with Saki.  She opened her mouth, probably to yell some more. Saki tensed.

And then, she had the very strange sensation of falling, like she had just dropped into an ice cold puddle that had no end.

Then there was nothing, no sound, nothing to see, nothing at all.

* * *

Minato frowned at the books.  Had Kakon really seen Kaede? Maybe he’d seen some random Ra Yellow working off some steam.  They pulled off another one.

Topi and Lurrie looked delighted by the idea of a game about pulling books from the shelves.  Lurrie grabbed one and yanked it off, letting it drop to the floor, and Topi copied. Minato jumped.

“Shh!” they hissed at them.  “Do  _ not _ !!”

Topi and Lurrie both just snickered at them, and pulled off more books in rapid succession.  

That sound was going to draw someone over here!  Minato reached forward and tried to grab the two of them, but they both flew out of their grip, pulling off books from the taller shelves, or splitting up so that Minato would have to pick one to chase after.  Krus just sat on the ground, face in hands, and Minato really wished that Topi and Lurrie were as well-behaved as her.

“Get back here!” they hissed, making a jump for Lurrie.

Lurrie squealed with delight, clearly thinking this was a game, and pulled off another book.

Or rather, Lurrie tried to pull off another book, but this one didn’t come off all the wall.  There was a faint  _ kerchunk _ sound, and Minato froze.  Topi and Lurrie both hesitated too.

Minato’s eyes shot up.

A panel in the wall above the shelves had just popped open.  A faint whistling sound came from inside, as though there were wind — and after a minute, the low scent of cold, musty air came down with it.  Minato shivered.

Was...this what Kaede had been trying to find?  They needed to tell Saki.

Leaving the mess on the floor, Minato bolted back to where Kakon and Saki would be.

“Saki!  We need to —”

There was...no one at the table.  Minato stared. Where had everyone gone?  Their stuff was still there. They grabbed their pager and started to look for Saki’s information.

Saki’s information was gone.  What about Kakon? Minato looked desperately through the Obelisk directory, but didn’t see any sign of the name Ashikaga Kakon.

Oh.

Oh fuck.

They were gone.

Minato grabbed hold of the pager in their shaking hands and dialed out a message to Yuki-sensei.


	28. The Plot of Armityle, Pt 2 - The Nothing Realm

“All right, rangers!! Sound off!”

Nina dabbed.

“Pink Ranger is in!” she shouted.

Giggling almost uncontrollably, Mylene tried to dab in the other direction to mirror Nina, but xe immediately had to slump over with giggles.

“B-Black Ranger, reporting for duty,” xe said, laughing.

“Yellow is here!” Taro shouted, throwing his arms up over his head to pose behind the other two of them.

“Blue Ranger ready for action!” Toitoi said, giggling almost as hard as Mylene while she attempted to do some kind of jazz hands pose.

“And I’m Red!” Mi-Gyeong said, putting her hands in front of her forehead in a funny pose in front of them.  “Power Rangers, ready to fight crime!”

They held their poses for a moment, voices ringing over the stillness of the cool, dim forest.  Mi-Gyeong dropped it first, slumping and sighing.

“It’s not easy acting like this is fun right now,” she said.

Mylene sobered up pretty quickly, standing up and rubbing the back of xir neck.  Toitoi looked down at the ground. For a moment, they all stood quietly, not really looking at each other.

“Come on, Rangers,” Nina said.  “Let’s cheer up a little! I’m sure we’ll find everyone soon.”

Nina looked between all of the Rangers group, trying to gauge how deep they were in the sad.  Mi-Gyeong rubbed her arms, shivering. Toitoi shrugged off her jacket and draped it over Mi-Gyeong’s shoulders.  Taro’s ears were plastered to his hair so tightly it was hard to see them, and his tail had tucked between his legs.  This was no good.

“Nina?  Is this normal for Duel Academia?” Toitoi mumbled.

Nina jumped.  She opened her mouth to say no, of course not — but then she remembered last year when Taro glanced at her with a nervousness in his eyes.  How was she supposed to cheer them all up in a situation like this? It was pretty scary...scarier than last year was.

“No,” she finally said, firmly.  “It’s not at all! But I mean...sometimes when you gather a lotta magic around in one place, it attracts bad things.  But that’s okay, because even if it’s scary, as long as we all stay together and work hard, and as long as we trust our teachers, it’s going to be okay!”

No one looked fully convinced.  But Mi-Gyeong managed a smile.

“Well,” she said.  “No hero ever had it easy, right?”

Mylene nodded, and after a beat, so did Toitoi.  Toitoi smacked her own cheeks a couple times.

“Urgh!! I just hope this gets solved soon so we can go back to not being freaked out!”

“I know, right?” Mylene said, letting out a groan of xir own.

Nina was about to agree when she saw Taro’s ears perk up and flick behind him.  Taro turned, sniffing at the air.

“What’s up?” she asked.

“I thought I heard someone walking in the woods,” Taro said.

He closed his eyes and sniffed a little more, leaning forward.  A light breeze rustled through the branches as his ears flicked a bit more.

“I...I definitely hear someone.  Just one person.”

“You’re sure?”

“Uh-huh.  They’re headed deeper in.  In the direction of the abandoned dorm.”

The group exchanged a horrified glance.

“Do you think it’s a teacher?” Mylene asked.

“No, sounds like their steps are too small.”

“Osiris kids wouldn’t go to the dorm by themselves, right?” Nina said worriedly.

“No, but what about the other students?  They don’t know about the danger!” said Mi-Gyeong, her eyes wide.

“What do we do, then?” Toitoi said.

For a minute, all of them just stared at each other.  Then Mi-Gyeong drew herself up to her full height.

“Let’s go!” she said.  “We have to come up with an excuse to pull them away from the dorm!  Black Ranger, Blue Ranger! Both of you have your pagers ready just in case we need to call a teacher!”

Mi-Gyeong’s determination seemed to snap them all out of their momentary freeze.  Mylene and Toitoi quickly pulled out their pagers, and the whole group ran off after Taro as he led the way into the woods.

They were making a huge racket, Nina thought.  Whoever they were following must know that they were nearby.  Taro’s ears pricked forward.

“Whoever it is, they’re running from us,” he said.  “They’re definitely going towards the dorm!”

“We’re not supposed to get too close,” Toitoi reminded them.

“We won’t!  We’ll just grab them and get them away!” Nina said.

But whoever they were chasing managed to keep ahead of them, because before they knew it, they were crashing out into the clearing around the abandoned dorm.  Immediately, all five of them froze, staring up at it. It looked as creepy as ever, but beyond that, it didn’t look dangerous. Just old and crumbling, and maybe a little ominous with its big black holes for windows and boarded up doors.

Nina looked down just in time to see someone disappearing through the doors — someone who was definitely in a blue coat, with a blue side ponytail.  Her mouth dropped open.

“Kylie?” she said.  “Wasn’t that Kylie?”

“Huh??” said Mi-Gyeong.

Nina pointed to the dorm.

“I just saw Kylie go inside!!”

“She went  _ in _ ?  Why?” Mylene said.

They all exchanged a look.  Nina felt dizzy and nervous.  She hadn’t seen Kylie since the the Obelisk war, but now here she was skulking around the dorm?  Why? A dare? Was she trying to learn something about Osiris there?

“We have to get her out,” she heard herself saying.

The whole group stared at her, and she jumped forward.

“I’m serious!! She might be a bitch, but if there’s something bad in there, she doesn’t have powers!!  She’ll be hurt!”

“I agree,” Mi-Gyeong said after a beat, but she looked pale.  “We can’t let something like that happen.”

“Oh my god,” Mylene said.  “We should call a teacher.”

“By the time a teacher gets here, it could be too late!” Nina said.  “If we can even just buy some time, it could make a difference!”

“What about Hanako’s vision?” Toitoi said.  “If we go in there, we might end up being the ones in her vision.”

“We might, but remember the other part?  The person in the blue coat in the fire? If we don’t go in, what if she gets burned up or something?” Nina said.  “It’s worth the risk!” 

They were all taking too long to make a decision!  Someone could get hurt in the meantime! She turned and started towards the dorm, but Taro grabbed her shoulder.

“Wait,” he said.

“I won’t!!  Listen, I know — it’s really scary!  And the teachers told us to stay out!  But — ”

“No, that’s not what I meant,” he said.  “I’ve been watching Mylene try to get a signal on xir pager since we ran out here.  You don’t have one, do you?”

Mylene startled, mouth dropping open.

“I don’t,” xe mumbled.  “We can’t call anyone.”

They all stared at each other.  Taro inhaled.

“Okay,” he said.  “Nina. You and me are the fastest out of all of us.  We’ll have to run, really fast, to find one of the teachers.”

“But then —”

“And we’ll go in,” Mi-Gyeong said, her face screwing up with determination.  “I can summon monsters, and Toitoi can start shadow games, and Mylene can use alchemy to build us weapons.  We’ll be the perfect team to go in while you get help!”

Nina stared at all of them, for the first time feeling panic.

“We can’t send them all in by themselves!! We’re the senpai!” she said.

“Yes, you can,” Mylene said, looking determined then, despite the shake in xir hands.  “We’re not weak, Nina. We’ve had all year to work on our powers. We can make you time to get to a teacher and come back.”

Nina shook.  Then Mi-Gyeong stepped forward, gripping her shoulder.

“That’s the plan, and I’m the red ranger,” she said, determined.  “Now have a little faith in your kohai!”

Nina swallowed.  She shook her head to clear it.  Then she briefly gripped Mi-Gyeong’s hands.

“Don’t stand and fight if it looks too strong.  Make sure you run if you have to,” she said.

“Roger!” Toitoi said, saluting.

They didn’t have time for more words.  They only nodded, and then bolted off on their respective missions.

* * *

Minato wasn’t supposed to be running around by themselves, but they didn’t have a choice — Saki was gone!  They tried to dial Yuki’s number on the pager again, but it wasn’t going through. In the distance, thunder rumbled, and they wondered if the storm was interfering with the signal.

They ran down the path, trying to figure out where to go from here.  Where would their teachers be right now? If he could even find just one — 

Topi and Lurrie forged ahead, and Minato wasn’t about to keep them hidden now.  They carried Krus in one arm while they tried to call again with their other hand.

Topi swooped down and screeched into Minato’s face, and they looked up to see Lurrie diving off towards the woods.  

“Did you see one of the teachers?”

Topi nodded frantically, and for once, neither of them seemed like they were dicking around.  Minato charged after them into the woods.

The foliage was smacking into their face, and they couldn’t really block it while holding and trying to shield Krus.  Which was probably why they ran into Yuki-sensei so hard that they bounced off of him.

Yuki grabbed them, steadying them before they tumbled backwards.

“Minato!” Yuki said. “What’s going on? What are you doing out here by yourself??”

Minato gasped for breath, trying to get their spotty vision to clear.  They saw with surprise that both Misawas were here too, as Topi and Lurrie flew around their heads and shrieked.

Minato grasped Yuki’s arm with theirs, still gasping.

“Saki,” they gasped. “Saki’s gone.  And I found something in the library.”

Yuki’s face went pale.  He swore. For the first time, as Minato blinked free of their exertion, they noticed that Yuki’s eyes had turned to a bichromatic orange and green, glowing faintly.

Yuki seemed about to say something else when two more figures burst out of the trees.  Nina bounced off of Tania’s back, and Taro caught her.

“Dorm!” Nina squeaked.  “Abandoned dorm!”

“What happened?  Were you two over there?” Misawa said, spinning around.

Nina gulped for breath, and Taro picked it up.

“We saw Kylie go inside the abandoned dorm,” he said, looking pale.  “Mi-Gyeong, Toitoi, and Mylene went in after her to try and get her out.”

Yuki swore.

“Goddammit!” he said. “I told you all to stay out of —”

He stopped himself, gasping for breath for a moment, composing himself.

“Tania, Misawa, please get to the dorm, quick,” he said.  “Support them and drag them out of there. I’m going to the library.”

“On it,” Tania said.

Before Minato’s eyes, Tania ripped a glove off of her hand, and then her body convulsed and bent forwards, warping into the shape of a tiger.  She bolted off into the trees, Misawa on her heels.

Nina made to spin off towards them, but Yuki reached out and grabbed her.

“No,” he said. “No, the less of you in that dorm, the better!  You guys are coming with me.”

“What?  But our friends — ” Nina said.

“I need to watch as many of you as possible.  And...and with more of us, we’ll have a better chance of keeping you all safe from falling into the dimensions that are popping up everywhere.  They can only fit so many — we can’t fall in as a group like this.”

Nina looked terrified, and Minato felt sick.  Yuki turned towards Minato, looking grim and almost frightening with his glowing eyes.  When he spoke, Minato could see that he had fangs in his mouth.

“Minato, lead the way to the library,” he said.  “Show me what you found.”

* * *

It felt like years before Saki opened her eyes, but it was probably only a few minutes.  She groaned, trying to rub her eyes clear, but when she opened them, it was just as white and blank as it had been before.  She frowned. Why was it so cold?

Slowly, she pushed herself up onto her hands and knees.

All around here there was nothing but whiteness.  Just an endless vastness in all directions. She couldn’t even tell what the ground was save for the fact that she was standing on it.

She heard a soft groan, and quickly turned.  Haruka laid beside her, looking like she was still barely awake.  Saki crawled over to her.

“Matsushita-san?  Are you okay?”

Haruka’s brow wrinkled, and her eyes squinted when she opened them.  Then her eyes opened wide, and she sat straight up, looking around at their surroundings.

“What did you  _ do _ ?” she snapped.

Saki immediately bristled.

“You think  _ I _ did this?  How would I?  I don’t know where we are either!”

“You’re the one who lured me out by myself!! How do I know you’re not doing that to the others?”

Saki could only gape at her with horror.  How could she think — 

She tightened her fists in her lap, leaning forwards.

“And what about you?” she said.  “You keep insisting that I called you out here, but I didn’t!!  And you’re the one who seems to hate the whole dorm and calls all of us freaks!  How do I know you’re not the one who’s making people disappear?”

Haruka flinched, and her lip trembled.  For the first time, she looked utterly terrified.

Saki pulled back, immediately regretting her words.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered.  “I shouldn’t have said that.”

Haruka just coughed out a hoarse laugh.  She curled her legs to her chest and hugged them to her.

“I guess I deserve that,” she mumbled.  “I would be the one you’d suspect.”

They sat in a long, awkward silence.  Then Saki stood up.

“Look,” she said.  “I don’t know how we got here, but I’m sure it’s not something either of us did.  So...let’s look for a way out together?”

She held her hand out to Haruka.  Haruka looked up at it, staring at it for a moment.  Then she stood up without taking it, shoving her hands into her pockets.

“Sure,” she mumbled.  “Whatever.”

Saki curled her hand back to herself and tried really hard not to take it personally.  Instead, she turned her attention to her surroundings, looking around for something that looked different from everything else.

Nothing did.  It was just one big world of emptiness.  She licked her dry lips.

Without a word, she just started walking.  To her credit, Haruka didn’t ask her if she knew what she was doing.  She just followed.

They walked for what felt like ages, but nothing changed.  It was impossible to tell if they were even actually moving.  This only lasted for a few minutes before both of them got upset.

“This is stupid!  How is this going to get us out?” Haruka said.

“I’m just trying something!! We won’t get out if we don’t try something first!” Saki snapped back.  “What’s your idea?”

“We’ll call someone,” Haruka said, as though it were perfectly obvious.

She pulled out her pager, and tried to hit a number.  Nothing happened. The pager didn’t even turn on. She swore, shaking it a few times.  Saki sighed. Part of her had sort of hoped...

Oh, hang on!  Hadn’t Saya made a device to talk across dimensions once?  How had she done that? Saki had only had a few formal alchemy lessons so far...

“Let me see your pager,” Saki said.

Haruka glanced at her suspiciously.

“I...I might know a way to make something that talks across dimensions,” she said.  “But I need something that has the purpose of communication.”

“Use yours,” Haruka said.

“I don’t  _ have _ mine.  It was on the table when we fell.”

Haruka hesitated.  Then she slowly handed her pager over.  Saki sighed with relief. Okay, now she needed something from the dimension she wanted to call.  She dug around in her pockets, and after a bit, she found a bit of torn leaf that was stuck to her shoe lace.  She laid that on the ground by the pager.

She frowned.  The last element she needed was something from the dimension she was already in, but...

She looked around.  Nothing. Nothing but endless white.  It was a realm of nothingness. How was she supposed to perform the alchemy without all the components?

“Well?” Haruka said impatiently.

Saki flushed.

“I...there isn’t anything here to fuse,” she mumbled.  “I don’t know...what to use.”

“Ugh!” Haruka shouted, throwing her hands into the air.  “You’re totally useless, then!! We’re stuck here forever!”

She snatched her pager back from the ground, and Saki shot to her feet, bristling again.

“Well, at least I’m trying!!  And Yuki-sensei will definitely find us!”

“Like he’s found the other missing kids already?”

Saki flushed a deep red.  She stepped closer to Haruka, drawing herself up to her full height.

“He’ll never give up on us!” Saki said.  “Yuki-sensei will never, ever give up on us!”

Haruka actually looked taken aback by Saki’s conviction, her mouth dropping open a little.  She stepped away from Saki to put space between them again, looking down at the floor.

“You trust him a lot, huh?” she said.

Saki nodded.  She felt a little trembly, now.  Haruka shook her head.

“You trust your teachers, you trust your monsters, you trust really everyone, don’t you?” Haruka said.  “You’re...stupid, aren’t you?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Saki said.

Haruka’s eyes flashed to Saki then, and her lips curled.

“I mean that you keep trusting people.  You trust everyone, even the monsters surrounding you — what are you going to do when they turn on you?  What are you going to do when someone finally lets you down?”

Saki trembled.  The words felt like knives.  Her mouth was dry.

“What are you going to do if your parents aren’t there to protect you, or when all the kids in your class decide to turn on you all at once?” Haruka was babbling now.  “You can’t trust everyone! They’ll burn you eventually!”

“Then what else am I supposed to do?” Saki blurted.

Haruka actually froze, staring at Saki.  Saki’s vision swam with tears. Her hands trembled, and she gripped her wrist with one hand.

“What’s the alternative?” she mumbled.  “If I’m waiting for someone to betray me at every second, how can I live like that?  M-maybe it will happen. Maybe someone will finally let me down. And — and they have, before.  B-but...but the more I trust people, and the more that I let them put their trust in me, then...then the better things turn out in the end.”

Haruka stared at her.  She shook her head.

“That message really was fake, wasn’t it?” she said.

“What makes you say that now??”

Haruka stuffed her hands back into her pockets, looking away.  Her ponytail shifted over her shoulder.

“The message,” she said, so quietly that Saki almost couldn’t hear.  “It said you knew what happened to me. That you wanted to talk about it.”

Saki’s anger and irritation slowly, slowly faded away.  Haruka looked really small all of a sudden.

“And...and why did you come, then?” Saki said.

Haruka shifted from one foot to the other.

“I was afraid you’d tell everyone,” she said, her voice so small. 

What was so bad that Haruka would be afraid of everyone knowing about it?  For a long, long moment, Saki stared at Haruka, tried to read something in her stance.  Then she sighed. She lowered herself to a seated position, leaned her elbows on her legs, and her face in her hands.

“I get let down all the time, you know,” Saki mumbled.

Haruka didn’t respond.

“Last year, my best friend almost dropped me, just because I stood up to her for once.”

This time Haruka shifted a little towards her.

“It’s Kaede, you know?  I’m sure you’ve seen her, from Ra.”

“And you guys are still  _ friends _ ?”

Saki nodded.

“We had a second chance.  Sometimes you get one, if you’re willing to wait for it.”

Haruka snorted, drawing her shoulders up around her ears.

“Then you’ve really never been totally let down, have you?  If you got them back.”

Saki stared off into the endless nothing.  Haruka was so sad, wasn’t she? Maybe that was why she lashed out.  And Saki felt a little awful, for claiming to know how she felt. 

Yet...if they were trapped here together...she wanted to at least try.  She wanted to try to understand.

“My dad hits me,” she said, before she thought about it.

Haruka’s eyes shot to her, eyes wide.  Saki felt a little odd. Oh. She’d said it out loud.  That was the first time she’d said it out loud.

“Not a lot,” Saki said.  “Just like...once or twice.  Because he’s mad at me for being in Osiris.”

Haruka fumbled, hands sliding out of her pockets, mouth opening and closing.

“He was always happy with me when I was getting good grades, but now he thinks that I’m not, and it makes him mad.  My mom doesn’t really stop him, either. Just tells me that I really should try harder.”

She looked up at Haruka, who was staring at her with wide eyes.  Saki shrugged.

“So I guess...I sort of get what you mean.  The people who shouldn’t let you down sometimes do.  They turn on you, and it sucks.”

“How do you keep trusting people then?” Haruka mumbled. 

Saki managed a smile.

“Because I really, really want to.”

Haruka only stared at her for a long, long moment.  Then she swore, and covered her mouth with her hand.

“Fuck,” she swore.  “You’re pulling the guilt card on me.”

“That’s not what I was trying to do.  Sorry.”

“Ugh!”

Haruka ground her knuckles into her temples.  Then she flopped down across from Saki.

“Okay, fine!! I’ll tell you the truth!  But you have to promise me you’ll never tell anyone, ever, okay??”

Saki rested her hands on her legs, and nodded.

“I promise,” she said.

Haruka growled.

“I don’t know why I’m doing this.  Trusting you. Maybe it’s cause I think we’re going to die in here.  Fuck. Now I hope we do.”

Saki almost laughed, but it would have been a really desperate sound.  Haruka buried her face in her hands.

“Okay,” she breathed.  “And really. If you...if you tell someone.  I’ll fucking kill you.”

Saki reached out, and touched Haruka’s knee.  Haruka drew up a little at the touch.

“I promise,” she repeated.

* * *

It was dark, and cramped, and Taro was so scared.  

As soon as Yuki had seen the opening that Minato had found in the library, he’d told them that they should go back to the dorm.  Minato had protested.  _ Kaede was seen around here.  She could be inside. Saki could be too, or hell, all of them! I’m not abandoning them!  _ And then Nina had shouted that he’d promised he wouldn’t ever force them to stay behind if there was something they could do to help.

Yuki had looked so pained.  He’d looked scared, and that was the scariest part.  He’d given in, though. They could come if they really wanted to, but let him take care of it if they found anything.

Taro had wanted to say no.  But Minato and Nina were going and the thought of losing sight of them was even more scary than whatever could be ahead. So he’d followed.

They crawled through a thin, downward sloping tunnel, just big enough for them to crawl along on their bellies.  Taro was at the back, as he’d insisted — if anything came from behind, he didn’t want Nina or Minato to be the ones to take it.

Lurrie was on Taro’s back, clinging to him with its tiny claws.  The little spirits had refused to be left behind, and Topi was on Nina’s back.  Minato was probably still carrying Krus. Taro could smell all kinds of things from up ahead — the musty scent of a cave that had rarely been entered, the moldy scent of standing water, some old trails from rats who’d come through.  It was almost too dark for even him to see at this point, though, and that scared him.

He heard Yuki-sensei let out a little swear up ahead, and heard his hands slip.

“It opens up at the end to a big drop,” Yuki said.  “Careful. I’m going to help you all down.”

Taro could only wait nervously, as finally, Nina moved forward ahead of him, and slipped out of the opening.  Judai reappeared a moment later, his eyes still glowing, and helped pull Taro out of the tunnel. He had great big leathery wings all of a sudden, and he held Taro gently as he pulled him free and then lowered him down to the ground.

He landed, then, and his wings folded back up under his skin.  There wasn’t even a mark on his clothes.

He put a finger to his lips, and the three of them nodded.  Even Topi and Lurrie were uncharacteristically silent.

Yuki led the way forward into the cave.  It was wide now, but still dark. Judging by the way Nina and Minato were stumbling, they couldn’t see.  Taro grabbed their hands so that he could guide them — it was hard, but he could still see the edges of stalagmites a little, and he could see Yuki-sensei’s back.

After a bit, the cave changed — man made paths were smoothed beneath their feet, and Taro could see beams over head as they walked into a circular sort of room, a room that had seven paths leading up to a raised altar sort of thing in the middle.  There were old cup like structures hanging from some of the beams, that must have once held torches a long time ago. On either side of the paths was nothing but darkness, and Taro’s skin crawled. If they fell down there, who know how far away the bottom was?  He carefully edged Minato and Nina away from the edge.

Yuki-sensei stopped before he even got onto the paths, however, making them all stop.  He stared into the darkness. Taro wanted to ask, but he didn’t want to make any noise, either.  So he waited, holding his breath.

Yuki raised his hand, then, and a small orb of light came to his palm.  He tossed it lightly up into the roof of the circular room.

Taro almost screamed.

Hanging from the ceiling were three bulbous, pulsing things, big and brown and bumpy, and  _ fleshy _ , like they were pumping full of blood.  One of them was long, and deformed looking wings were protruding out of its sides.  Another was thicker and looked almost like it was taking a human shape, though the last hadn’t taken on any recognizable shape at all.

The longer one actually moved.  A bulbous protrusion that might have been a head swiveled towards them.  Two mouths split open with acidic slime dripping from sharp teeth.

It screamed at them.  The sound shook the room, and the other two shapes began to shift towards them.

Yuki threw his arms out on either side of him.

“Kids,” he gasped.  “Run.”


	29. The Plot of Armityle, Pt 3 - Summon, Bujingi Fox!

Mi-Gyeong’s heart raced, and her mouth was dry.  Did the Power Rangers ever feel this freaked out before a battle?  Well, yeah, they did sometimes, that was usually a plot point early on.  But she felt so nervous that she thought she was going to throw up.

The doors hung off their hinges, and inside it was dark as pitch.  She edged forward, careful about the stairs, worried they might collapse under her her feet.  It creaked loudly.

“Anyone have a light?” she said.

“I’ve got an app on my phone,” said Mylene.

Xe turned it on and swung the light in through the doors.  It didn’t go very far, swallowed up by the dust, but Mi-Gyeong could see that it looked a lot like the upperclassmen Osiris Dorm, with a big staircase in the front and probably two wings going off the sides.  Everything was quiet and eerily still. It made Mi-Gyeong feel like she was being watched. And if this is how scared  _ she _ was, knowing that she could summon her monster friends into the real world to protect them at a moment’s notice, wouldn’t Kylie be even more scared?  She had to be a hero and go in without fear.

“Okay,” she said.  “We stay together. No splitting up.”

“Sounds good to me,” Toitoi said, voice shaking a little.

Mylene nodded. 

“How do we figure out where she went?” xe asked.  “It’s a big building.”

Toitoi grabbed xir before xe could walk in through the doors, pointing to the floor.

“Wait,” she said.  “Look! The dust is so thick, she left a trail!”

Mylene swung xir light to the floor, and sure enough, there were scuff marks left in the dust.  They went straight back to a door on the other side of the staircase.

“Good eye, Blue Ranger!” Mi-Gyeong said.  “Okay. I’ll go first. Mylene, you stick behind me with the light, and Toitoi, you guard our rear.”

“Roger,” said Mylene, saluting.

Despite trying to make it like a game, Mi-Gyeong still shook, and she could tell the other two were nervous too.  She swallowed thickly, and then without more hesitation, led the way into the dorm. She turned on her Duel Disk and held it in front of her, hands ready to grab cards and summon something.

They followed Kylie’s marks through the floor to the door.  The silence of the place was what really got to her. The teachers had told them to stay away from here, so she’d imagined it was crawling with ghosts, or shadows with glowing eyes like Mylene had described xir encounter with Taro.  But nothing moved. She didn’t even sense anything, like she’d been learning to do in class. There was just this yawning sense of total emptiness and abandonment.

The door was hanging open, and at the bottom of the stairs, there was nothing but darkness.  Mylene shone the light, but the stairs were just long enough that it wouldn’t reach. Mi-Gyeong inhaled.

“Kylie?” she called.  “Kylie Harbison? Are you down there?  Are you okay?”

No answer.  The darkness just sat there, unmoving. Mi-Gyeong felt like throwing up again.  She swallowed, and she took one step down onto the stairs.

Somewhere at the bottom, a distant light flickered to life.  It was somewhere off to the side, so she couldn’t see it but for the spill that spread over the floor in the view of the stairs.  She heard a faraway rumble, of a voice she couldn’t make out — 

And then someone screamed.

Mi-Gyeong didn’t wait.  She grabbed cards from the top of her deck, and her monsters reacted to her distress, giving her exactly what she needed.

“I fuse Metalfoes Goldriver and Metalfoes Silverd from my hand!” she shouted.  “Fusion summon! Metalfoes Orichalc!”

Her monster burst to life in front of her, clad all in gold armor with an apparatus of wheels attached to its back.  It was almost too big to fit in the stairwell, and its weight put cracks into the stairs when it settled. Mi-Gyeong leaped onto its back and clung on as it zoomed down the stairs, Mylene and Toitoi right on her heels.

They reached the bottom of the stairs in a rush, and Mi-Gyeong let herself fall back and land on her feet.

Before them spread a large, stone basement, huge and perfectly circular.  A raised dais encircled the whole room along the edges, and on the depressed section in the middle, there were thick ruts carved into the floor in circular, pentagram-like designs, like some kind of demon sigil.  Mi-Gyeong almost felt like throwing up. All of the ruts were full of this disgusting, goopy black stuff, that bubbled and popped like thick oil and molasses on its own.

The light was coming from a flashlight that was on the floor in the middle of the room — and beside that light was Kylie.

Kylie was on her knees, gasping for breath.  That black oil-y goop was clinging to her from the knees up to her chest, but she didn’t even seem to notice.  She was mumbling to herself, flipping through the pages of a thick book covered in crumbly looking black vines.

“Kylie!” Mi-Gyeong shouted, and Kylie flinched as though she’d been struck.

She whirled on her knees to face them, her eyes wide and bloodshot, her hair falling out of its ponytail.  Mi-Gyeong actually did throw up in her mouth this time. The goop wasn’t clinging to her — it was coming  _ out _ of her.  It was dripping from the pores in the backs of her hands and running down her neck from somewhere inside her hair.

“Kylie, it’s okay, we’re going to help,” Mi-Gyeong started.

She wasn’t prepared for Kylie’s face to contort with anger, and for her to struggle up to her feet and raise a hand towards her.

Toitoi was the fastest, grabbing Mi-Gyeong and taking her down to the floor just as a sloppy mess of black gloop flew over their heads.  It struck the wall behind them and Mylene swore. Mi-Gyeong’s head spun, but she struggled back to her feet, shoving Toitoi behind her.

“Just disappear,” Kylie gasped, more black ooze beginning to drip from her tear ducts like disgusting tears.  “Just disappear already, you wastes of space!”

Kylie wasn’t the one in trouble, Mi-Gyeong realized with a panic.  

She was the one  _ causing _ it.

* * *

Minato, for one moment, raised their Duel Disk as though to ignore Yuki-sensei’s command.

They were not prepared for Nina to be the one to grab them by the back of the collar and yank them forcibly back from the dark room.

In front of them, as Nina dragged both them and Taro backwards, Minato saw Lurrie and Topi going crazy.  Krus clung to their collar and gave out terrified, choking sobs, while their other two spirits began shooting around like madmen, flying at Minato’s face as though to tell them to turn and keep running.

Minato hesitated only a minute before they did — and before they did, they saw something that briefly took their breath away.

Yuki-sensei’s jacket burst as his wings exploded back through his shoulder blades again.  Thick, dark scales sprouted down his arms and hands, and he seemed to grow taller, as spikes shot out of his shoulders and from his elbows, and claws burst in place of nails.  Minato caught the blur of Yuki-sensei’s glowing green and orange eyes as he exploded into the darkness, just as a writhing mass of fleshy vines tried to come for the running students.

It happened so quickly.  Yuki-sensei cut through them with his claws like they were made out of paper.  More grew out of the bulbous shapes from the ceiling, but now they weren’t bothered with the kids — they were only bothered with the small and sharp shadow that was Yuki-sensei.

Then Nina finally wrenched Minato around, and they were running blindly into the dark.

“Watch out!” Taro shouted, grabbing hold of Minato’s shoulder and yanking them and Nina to the side.  Minato felt their shoulder graze a stalagmite. Fuck! They couldn’t see a thing in here!

“Is it okay to leave him?” Minato gasped.

Nina grabbed Minato’s hand in the dark, and they were shocked at how bad she was shaking.

“We promised just one thing,” she gasped.  “That if he told us to run, we would. Because that meant it was  _ way too bad _ .”

Taro grabbed Nina’s other hand.

“Can you lead the way out?” Nina asked him.

“I smell something this way,” Taro said.  “Follow me!”

Minato felt so utterly helpless.  All they could do was run, clinging to Nina’s hand and hoping that they wouldn’t run into anything in the dark.  Why had they insisted on coming along? They probably could have been more help anywhere other than this!

Taro stopped suddenly, and all three of them smacked into him.  He yelped, and Minato heard a soft splashing and then the slopping of someone tracking water back onto the stone.

“What is it?” Nina asked nervously.

“Water,” Taro said.  “It’s an underground stream!  It has to go somewhere!”

“Taro, we have no idea how far it goes!  We won’t be able to hold our breaths — and it’s dark!” Minato said.  “We need to find our way back to the passage out.”

“We’d get too close to the Phantasms that way,” Taro said, voice shaking.

Phantasms.  Minato swore.  They hadn’t wanted to say it out loud, but Taro was right — whatever their teacher was facing back there, it was a new version of the Phantasms somehow.  They couldn’t get in the way of Yuki-sensei’s fight and put themselves in danger.

“I’ll summon a monster!” Nina said.  “I have a dragon who can see how far the water goes!”

Minato snapped back to themself.  Oh, fuck, right — they had powers they could be using!  

“I know I’ve got someone who can make light,” they said.  “Give me a second.”

Topi landed on their shoulder and clung there while Minato shifted Krus to their other arm, letting her cling to his other shoulder while they fumbled through their deck.  Taro had to lean over and help them find the card they were looking for.

“I summon Fabled Miztoji,” they said.

A short, bulbous little man with big goggles and ragged bat wings, clad in a baggy black cloak, appeared beside Minato, letting out a hacking sort of cough.

“Miztoji, could you please make us some light?” they asked.

Miztoji coughed again, and then lifted up one hand.  A crackling ball of red light came to its palm, setting them all alight.  Minato could finally see where they were — the cave was too big to see the ceiling with this little bit of light, but they could see the river that Taro had found.  It went into a crack in the wall, and it looked super deep. Taro was right, this could be a way out — but it might not be safe.

Now with the light, Nina dug through her deck to find the monster she needed.

“Come on out, Stream, Dragon Ruler of Droplets!” she said.

A tiny, pearlescent blue dragon popped into existence.  It immediately shot to Nina, running up her leg and landing on her shoulder to nuzzle her face.  She smiled, but she was clearly too nervous to be too excited.

“Stream, can you swim down this river and see how far it is to another place we can breathe?” she asked.

Stream warbled and nodded its head wildly.  It dove into the water and disappeared. For a long moment, they were just standing there, counting off the seconds with a growing nervousness.  In the distance, Minato heard the echoes of Yuki-sensei’s fight, and then a cutting shriek ran through the cave. Oh, fuck, they couldn’t tell how close that was.  They turned towards the way they’d come and held up their Duel Disk, ready to fight if necessary. Lurrie dove and swooped around them, hissing.

The river bubbled, and Stream popped back out of the river, shaking itself off and diving over to Nina. It chittered in her ear, but she frowned.

“I’m sorry, I just realized I still don’t speak dragon,” she said, looking white.

“I do,” said Taro, jumping forward.  “Stream-san, which way do we go?”

Stream leaned towards Taro and chittered and clicked.  Taro nodded.

“Stream says that this river goes to another passageway, a little higher than where we are now,” he said.  “It doesn’t know where that passage goes, but it smells fresher air, so it must have a way out.”

“How far?” Minato asked.

Stream chittered again.  Taro swallowed.

“About forty feet, maybe fifty,” he said.  “I don’t know if I can go that far that fast.”

“I definitely can’t,” Minato said.  “And I don’t think Miztoji can come with us to give us light, so we could be bumping around down there for too long.”

Miztoji hacked in agreement.

“Don’t give up!” Nina said with determination.  “I have another idea!”

She patted Stream on the head and gave it a little kiss on the nose, and then released it.  She walked to the water then, and inhaled. She slapped another card onto her disk.

“Mythic Water Dragon!  Please help us!”

The river bubbled, and then, from the depths, rose a wispy, almost see through head.  The head was huge, almost bigger than Nina, and sharp teeth came out of its jaw — the rest of it, however, seemed to be made out of a thin sheet of water.

“I’ve only done this once,” Nina said.  “And only by myself. Minato, you should release your spirit friends.”

Minato nodded.  Topi and Lurrie protested briefly, and Krus clung to their shirt, but they murmured that they’d summon them back right away, and all four of them vanished.

It was dark again, and Minato couldn’t see much but for Nina’s shadow.  She was talking to the big water dragon, and it nodded, resting its head on the surface of the water and then raising up part of its body, looking like the river itself was lifting up.

“Hold your breath,” Nina said.  “And take my hand!”

Minato grabbed her hand, and Taro grabbed the other.  Minato had just managed to gulp down a breath of air when Nina had them all leap directly into the dragon’s watery body.

It was like being plunged into a warm bath, but one that was super buoyant, that they were literally floating inside.  They felt themselves bob downwards, but they weren’t sinking. And then, like a massive current, they were swept forwards into the dark.

* * *

“What do we do?  What do we do?” Toitoi shouted.

Mi-Gyeong swore, ducking behind Orichalc again.  Orichalc managed to shield the three of them, but Mi-Gyeong could tell that her monster was getting tired — and she didn’t want to force it to keep taking so much damage!

Kylie was looking worse and worse.  The ooze kept running into the floor all around her, and she was still crying the gross stuff, though her face was red with anger and frustration.  Well, she seemed to know what she was doing with this stuff, maybe they should just run and let the teachers handle it! Clearly, she didn’t need to be rescued!

Mi-Gyeong looked back around Orichalc again, noted how wide Kylie’s eyes were and how heavy she was breathing, the way that her hands were shaking, like it was taking all of her energy just to stand and hold that book.

Maybe she  _ did _ need rescuing.

Mi-Gyeong let out a little roar to psych herself up.

“Mylene!  What do you know how to make so far?”

“Fuck, I’ve barely learned anything!” Mylene said, eyes wide.

“Anything could help!  Just think! Toitoi and I will cover you while you try to make something that can at least pause her!”

“We  _ will _ ?” Toitoi yelped.

“Okay,  _ I _ will!” Mi-Gyeong said.  “I activate Monster Reborn to bring back Metalfoes Silverd!”

The floor glowed, and her monster rose up from inside it.  The figure was tall, lanky, and had short pink hair. It rode on top of a sleek mini airplane, which it revved before shooting towards Kylie, trying to throw her off balance.  Kylie screamed, and the should reverberated as though she had more than one voice. The goop shot upwards from the ruts on the floor to defend her from Silverd’s attack, and the monster had to fall back with something that sounded like a swear.

How long could Mi-Gyeong keep this up??  She was already feeling the strain of holding two monsters at once — her skin was getting clammy with sweat, and she felt dizzy.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” Mylene kept mumbling, and Mi-Gyeong hoped that xe wasn’t just having a panic attack.  If this went on — she’d have to order a retreat. She didn’t want to leave Kylie behind, but not at the expense of the others!

Mylene yelped then, and shot to xir feet.

“Toitoi!  Grab me some of that goop!”

“ _ What _ ?” Toitoi said.

“Use this glove, but bring it, fast!  I think I already have the other components I need!”

Toitoi grabbed the glove that Mylene threw to her.  To her credit, she didn’t hesitate. She kept shaking, but she pulled the glove on. 

“Silverd will cover you!” said Mi-Gyeong.

“Fucking freaks, just vanish already!” Kylie screamed again, but her voice cracking, and Mi-Gyeong could see the absolute terror in her eyes as more goop came out of her lips this time.  God, this was gross.

Toitoi ducked beneath Silverd’s airplane, and the monster hovered over her as she darted towards the lowered part of the room.  She ducked down, swore, and grabbed some goop in her gloved hand. Kylie tried to attack her with another wash of the stuff, but Silverd shot in front of her.  Mi-Gyeong felt a lurching feeling in her chest, and suddenly Silverd was gone. The card on her Duel Disk had turned white where the art should be, and the text box was blank.  Bile rose in her throat.

Toitoi ducked back — Kylie shot more goop at her, but miraculously, her aim seemed to have gone wild.  Toitoi skidded back to Mylene and dropped the goop on the floor in front of xir. Mi-Gyeong reached for another monster while Orichalc took the offensive, trying to draw fire to itself.

Mylene had a bunch of small metal bits on the floor, and xe poured some powder over it.  With the other glove on one of xir hands, xe grabbed for the goop and scooped it on top of xir pile of things.  Xe mumbled something, clapped xir hands together twice, and then pressed xir palms to the top of the stuff. It pushed into the ground for a moment — there was a pop, and when Mylene took xir hands away, there was a small round, silver egg shape.  Xe threw it to Toitoi, who snagged it out of the air.

“Throw it at Kylie,” Mylene said.

“What if I miss??”

“You’re the luckiest person alive, Toitoi!! You got the golden eggwich six times in a row, and one of those times it was after someone else had already drawn it, so somehow you found a fucking second one!  Throw the fucking egg!”

Toitoi went bright red with embarrassment and panic.  But she wheeled on her heels and shouted. Mi-Gyeong pulled Orichalc back.  Toitoi cranked her arm backwards, yelled incoherently, and flung.

The egg struck true, right in Kylie’s chest.  Her eyes opened with a wide “o” of astonishment.  Then the silver melted against her chest, and turned into some strange webbing of thin silver filaments that grew all across her chest and down her shoulders.  

The goop stopped pouring out of her, and what was on her seemed to be sucked up in an instant by the silver webbing.  She stumbled back, looking pale with shock. The goop in the ruts was still there, and it began to bubble far more aggressively, as though it had suddenly started to boil.

Mi-Gyeong didn’t wait.  She grabbed hold of Orichalc, and it seemed to respond to her thoughts, scooping her up in one arm and launching her across the room.  She landed with an athletic grace in front of Kylie and reached for her arms.

“Don’t touch me!” Kylie screamed.

“We’re getting you out of here!”

Kylie screamed again.  She slammed her hand onto the book bofore Mi-Gyeong could touch her.

A crackle of heat tickled her face.  And then a wild roar of flames seared past her and she was on the ground.  Smoke and fire filled her lungs and she gasped, choking and flailing. Kylie stumbled backwards, looking around in horror at the flames.  She dropped the book, and the pages began to blacken and curl. She started to cough against the heavy black smoke that was filling the air in an instant.  The flames, however, seemed not to be touching her, or even catching at her uniform.

The same couldn’t be said for Mi-Gyeong.  Flames licked against her arms and she screamed.  

“Mi-Gyeong!!”

Arms grabbed her under the armpits, and she felt Mylene dragging her backwards, away from Kylie.  She saw Toitoi leap in front of her, heard her shouting and saw her waving her arms, but she couldn’t make out any of the words.  Kylie seemed to be shouting back, trying to edge back away as the flames quickly grew higher and higher. Mi-Gyeong felt dizzy. There was no way this was normal.  It couldn’t be. The flames had started way too quickly, and how were they catching fire on the stone?

“Wait,” Mi-Gyeong gasped.

“We can’t!  We need to get out of here!” Mylene shouted.

“But...but Kylie...”

“Fuck, she’s the one trying to kill us!”

“N-no, please, she’s scared...Toitoi!  D-Don’t — don’t leave her!”

Mylene had already dragged Mi-Gyeong all the way to the stairs, and Mi-Gyeong was so dizzy from the smoke that she couldn’t protest.  Toitoi kept backing away with them, trying to put herself in between Kylie and the other two as though she would hurt them. Mi-Gyeong couldn’t see very well.  Mylene swore as xe tried to haul Mi-Gyeong up the stairs by her armpits, struggling to keep a good grip on her. 

A stone nearby the stairs wiggled.  Mi-Gyeong tried to shout. What was that??  Why was the floor moving?

The floor popped upwards — or at least, one stone did.  A shape poked out of the hole that was left in the floor — and immediately started coughing.

“Gah!  What’s this??  Out of the water, into the...fire?”

Mi-Gyeong gasped and Toitoi swore.  Nina! That was Nina’s head poking out of the flames!  Mi-Gyeong managed to struggle out of Mylene’s grip, gasping as she crawled towards Nina.  Mylene moved forwards too, grabbing for Nina’s hands. Xe and Toitoi hauled Nina out of the hole, and Nina looked around at the flames with horror.

“What’s going on?” she shouted over the crackle and roar.

“Kylie did something!” Mylene shouted back. 

Mi-Gyeong turned back towards where they had left Kylie.  She was on her knees now, still surrounded and yet not touched by the flames.  The goop was coming back, though, she said with horror. Kylie had her head clutched in her hands, and she was shaking — or was that just the way the fire was flickering around her.

Minato’s head came up out of the hole next, and they swore.  Toitoi helped them climb out, and then Taro was lifting himself free, coughing and covering his mouth with his hands.

“Is this the fucking dorm?” Minato swore.  “Where’s the way out?”

“Stairs!” was all Toitoi could shout, pointing behind her to the stairs right nearby.

Mi-Gyeong grabbed for Nina’s arm though, before Mylene could start trying to help her up again.

“Wait!” she said.  “I know — Kylie did this, but — but she’s hurt!  Whatever she did, I don’t think she knows how to stop it!”

Nina looked with wide eyes to where Mi-Gyeong was pointing.  Her face hardened and set. She nodded, and yanked herself free of Mi-Gyeong.  Minato shouted as Nina dove back into the flames. She coughed, waving her hands around, pushing through the fire.

Mi-Gyeong couldn’t see very well, the smoke was getting to her.  This time, she let Mylene grab her and start hauling her towards the stairs.

She managed to see, just barely, though, that Nina skidded back to meet them, with Kylie draped over her shoulders.  She was unconscious, and Mi-Gyeong wasn’t sure what had done it — the dark powers she’d done, the fire...or Nina.

* * *

Haruka took forever to finally get started talking.  Even though she said she would, she kept starting and stopping and starting over.  Saki waited patiently. Clearly, Haruka hadn’t had anyone to talk to for a really long time, and she was having trouble figuring out how.  It wasn’t like they had anywhere else to be, anyway.

“I...didn’t have... _ friends _ ...when I was a kid,” Haruka said haltingly.  “Because...I could see the monsters, right away, as soon as I was old enough to know about it.  And they were always everywhere.”

She swallowed, rubbing the back of her neck.

“I wasn’t scared of them when I was little.  They were always all over my school, coming to visit with me, glad that someone could see them.  I thought they were yokai at first, until I discovered Duel Monsters and recognized a lot of the spirits.  So I started playing. And that’s...when I met Sparky.”

Her cheeks darkened, and she shot Saki a look as though to dare her to say something.  Saki just smiled reassuringly, and nodded for her to go on. Haruka looked away.

“The other spirits came and went, but Sparky was always around.  They’d snuggle with me when I was sad, try to scare off bullies even though they couldn’t see them.  I wasn’t allowed to have a dog, so it was like having a pet who was your best friend.”

Saki bit her lip.  She wanted to say something, but she was afraid that if she did, she’d break the spell, and Haruka would clam up again.

“As soon as I found their card, I built my whole deck around them.  I was winning all the time with their help, and the help of the other spirits.  I thought...I thought we’d always be together.”

Haruka looked like she was on the verge of tears now, and she furiously rubbed at her eyes.

“But then I realized something awful.  Even if...even if we seemed like friends, they were still monsters.  They were still  _ Duel _ Monsters.  They still had to play by the rules.”

Saki leaned forward, putting a hand on Haruka’s knee.

“What happened?”

Haruka didn’t take her hands from her eyes, just leaning her face into them.

“I was fighting with Sparky, just like always,” she said.  “But then someone used a Magic Cylinder. Sparky’s attack hit me.  And it wasn’t like a hologram, either. I felt it. It  _ hurt _ .”

Saki’s lips parted.  She wanted to say ‘but that wasn’t Sparky’s fault!’ but she didn’t want to speak.

“I tried to rationalize.  That was just the spell card.  Sparky didn’t mean to hurt me. But then the next time we played, someone...used Creature Swap.  They stole Sparky. They told Sparky to attack me. And they didn’t just attack me — they bit so hard it drew blood.  I had to go to the hospital, and nobody understood what had happened to me.”

Haruka was shaking now.

“Sparky came back that night and I screamed at them.  The doctors didn’t know what was wrong so they sedated me.  I never saw Sparky again.”

Saki felt like  _ she _ was going to cry now.  But Haruka kept talking.

“I know what you’re about to say!  It still wasn’t Sparky’s fault! They just had to follow the rules of the game.  They probably didn’t know how hard they were hitting me, or even know what they were doing!  But that’s just it, isn’t it?? They’re monsters. They  _ have  _ to follow the rules of the game, even if they don’t want to.  And someday, someone will use them against you again, and how can I  _ deal _ with that —”

She stopped when Saki hugged her.  Saki held her as tight as she could, trying not to cry and failing horribly.  Haruka shook her arms.

“Stop it,” she mumbled.  “Stop touching me.”

Saki let go of her.  Haruka’s eyes were already red and puffy.

“So what?” she said, glaring at Saki.  “You think that I’m stupid, right? That I should have trust Sparky after what they did?”

Saki shook her head, and Haruka blinked with surprise.

“Matsushita-san...I think  _ you’re  _ the one who misses Sparky,” Saki said quietly.

Haruka flinched.

“I don’t!  I really don’t,” she said.

“But it hurts to think about them, right?  You remember all the good times, and...and you want to see them again, right?”

Saki started crying again.  She couldn’t even imagine it.  Not seeing Angel ever again? That would be the most empty feeling in the world.  Haruka kept crying and swearing under her breath, but she was too choked up to talk much.

“They hurt me,” Haruka mumbled.  “Even if they didn’t mean to...I was scared.  I was scared that it could happen again, and...fuck.  Fuck you.”

She buried her face in her hands and continued to cry.  Saki could only sit there, tears rolling down her cheeks.  Then she shook her head. She slapped her hands against her cheeks and let out a loud roar the way Nina did when she was psyching herself up.  Haruka’s head snapped up with surprise, but Saki was already on her feet, hands in fists.

“All right!” she said.  “We’re going to find a way out of here!  So that you and Sparky can meet again!”

“What are you talking about?” Haruka mumbled.

“I’m sure I can think of something!”

“You’ve already tried shit, and it hasn’t worked.”

Saki frowned, rubbing her chin.  But what  _ could _ she do?  Think, Saki, think.  Think outside the box.  She couldn’t copy what Saya had done to talk outside of this dimension.  But then...oh! Saya had said that Saki’s form of alchemy was different. She’d used her alchemy to combine Saya and Hinata’s powers to make something that helped Hinata.

Think harder.  Hinata had once been trapped in another world, and she was connected to whatever was going on here.  Maybe she’d been in a small pocket world just like this. Saki had gotten her out by using...World Dragon’s swords!  That’s it! World Dragon could cut through worlds!

“Angel?” Saki called.  “Angel!!”

She listened and waited, but it seemed like her voice wasn’t reaching.  Angel might not be able to make it inside here — but she’d need his help in order to get to World Dragon’s swords.  So how did she find a way to call Angel?

“Matsushita-san!  What kind of monster was Sparky?”

“Huh?  Why is that important?”

“I might be able to find a way out of here, but I need to know what we have to work with.”

Haruka stared at her, but then she shook her head like Saki was crazy.  Still, she answered.

“Bujingi Fox,” she said.  “I used to use Bujins. But I don’t have any of their cards with me right now —”

Bujins.  Bujins...Saki was pretty sure she’d heard of those before!  What did they do?

“Tell me what you do with a Bujin deck!”

“Geez, chill out!!  It’s...it’s a deck where you banish monsters in the graveyard to protect your monsters on the field.”

Saki felt her eyes bulge.  She dropped down and grabbed Haruka’s shoulders, shaking them excitedly.

“Bujins banish themselves!” she said.  “Matsushita-san — Sparky might be able to come into this world!”

Haruka’s eyes widened.  Then she shoved Saki’s hands off of her.

“And how do you figure that??”

“If you call for them, they’ll definitely answer!  I’m sure of it!”

“Stop.”

“It might be our way out!  You have to call for him!”

“I — I can’t!” Haruka said, her voice cracking, hands shaking.  “I can’t! I...they don’t want to come! N-not after what I said to them!”

Saki gripped Haruka’s arms again and looked right into her eyes.

“Matsushita-san,” she whispered.  “Just this once — try trusting Sparky.  One more time.”

Haruka stared at her.  Her bottom lip trembled, and her eyes were glassy with tears.  She squeezed her eyes shut for a moment. She inhaled. Then she let out a loud, ringing shout that seemed to echo off of their prison.

“ _ SPARKY! _ ”

“Sparky!” Saki shouted too.  “Sparky!”

Haruka jumped to her feet, bellowing up into the vast white.

_ “SPARKY!” _

“Sparky!”

“SPARKY!”

Saki felt like she was going to pass out from how much she was shouting.  Tears rolled down Haruka’s cheeks as she shouted. She had to stop to inhale and shout again.

Before she could, though, there was a small crackling sound.  Static rose on the back of Saki’s arms as a small ball of gold light appeared among the white.  Haruka choked on a breath. For a moment, the light struggled. It looked like a bubble trying to force its way through a small hole, warping and getting sucked back a little as it tried.

And then Haruka dropped to her knees and threw her arms out white.

“Sparky!”

The light popped all the way through.  A beautiful, golden fox made of light, edged with metallic armor-like pieces on its head, back, and tail.  The fox leaped forward, crashing right into Haruka’s chest. For a moment, Saki jumped, wondering if Haruka had been right in being afraid of Sparky.  But Haruka started crying again, and Sparky was wiggling their entire body in her arms as she hugged and stroked and nuzzled the fox, while they seemed to try and crawl into her skin they were so desperate for affection.

Saki let the two of them snuggle for a moment, and when they seemed to calm down a little, Haruka pressing her head to Sparky’s head, she inhaled.

“Hi,” she said, and Sparky looked up at her.  “You must be Sparky. I’m Saki!”

Sparky let out a small, polite little yip.  Haruka shook a little, wiping a tear from her eye.  Saki stepped forward and knelt in front of Sparky.

“Sparky, are you able to leave this world freely?”

Sparky looked around.  They stepped back from Haruka for a moment and sniffed the air.  Then their tail drooped.

“Bujingi Fox can only banish itself, it can’t bring itself back,” Haruka mumbled.

“Is there a monster in the deck that can bring others back?” Saki asked.

Haruka bit her lip.  It seemed to take her a while to remember.

“I...I think so,” she said.  “But I don’t remember how to summon it.”

Saki shook her head, smiling.  She could feel a swirling in her chest, and it had started as soon as Sparky had arrived.  The alchemy inside her knew what to do now.

“That’s okay,” she said.  “Matsushita-san, Sparky, I just need both of your help just one more time.”

“Fuck,” Haruka said shaking her head.  “If you’re going to get us out of here, just do it.”

Saki held her hand out, and Haruka took it.  Saki closed her eyes. She could feel it, now.  The warm, swirling energy in her chest, and the cooler, more rigid energy in Haruka’s.  Sparky put their nose on top of Haruka and Saki’s hands, and Saki felt the crackling, warm light energy of the spirit fox.

She squeezed tightly, and siphoned off some of that energy into her own chest.

She felt that awful, stabbing pain again, like there was a thorn stabbed into her heart.  But she inhaled, and exhaled, and let it keep working. A cry escaped her as the pain seemed to stab all the way through her.  Haruka’s hand tightened on hers.

“Yamaguchi??  What’s wrong?”

“It...hurts a little,” Saki grunted.  “But I think...I think I’ve almost...”

She had all the pieces she needed — the warm, sparkling power of Bujingi Fox, a spirit with the ability to banish itself to another world, and to call for a greater spirit that Saki could just barely taste the power of, that could call the fox back.  The cool, rigid power of Haruka, with an even deeper connection to the spirit that could call them back. And then Saki’s own warm, swirling power, inherently connected to World Dragon — the dragon whose swords could piece worlds. All she needed was to combine those to things, into something that could pierce the worlds, and call them back — call back everyone who had disappeared into a pocket world like this!

She screamed as the pain seemed to shoot out of her.  Haruka swore, and almost let go of Saki’s hand, but she gripped it tightly, unable to let go just yet.  Sparky growled and kept their head on top of their hands firmly.

Saki reached up to her chest with her other hand, gasping for breath.  She found something solid there, and grabbed it. Haruka swore again. Then Saki ripped the sword out of her chest.

As soon as it was out of her, the pain stopped in an instant.  She gasped, staring up at the long, elegant blade that she’d just dragged out of her own chest.  It was long, thin, and a silver twisted together with bronze in a beautifully harmonious design. A soft, ethereal glow encased it, staining even the pure white around them.

“What the  _ fuck _ ,” Haruka swore.

Saki just swallowed, her hand slightly shaking from where she held the sword.

“Hold tight!!” she said.

Haruka gripped her hand, threw her arm around Sparky’s ruff, and braced herself.  Saki inhaled.  _ Oh please let this work. _

She pointed the sword in front of her, and thrust.

All at once, light poured in through the hole she’d just ripped in the world.  She hacked at the spot one more time.

The white world around them cracked and crumbled — and then exploded.

Saki let out a yelp, Haruka screamed, and then — 

They were lying on the library floor, staring up at the ceiling.  Sparky sat next to Haruka, transparent now. Their tag swished back and forth very slowly.

Haruka and Saki just laid there for a moment.  Saki was distantly surprised to see that she was still holding the sword, as solid and real as it had been before.  How odd. World Dragon’s sword had disappeared from her after she’d used it to cut Hinata free.

Then Haruka let out a small giggle.  Saki felt her lips cracking wide too.

And they both started laughing.  Saki couldn’t stop — she couldn’t breathe, and she couldn’t stop.  Oh god. Oh god!! How stupid they must look, lying on the floor, laughing their asses off, one of them holding a sword??  Saki really hoped, in between gasping giggles, that no one walked in on them like this.

“You crazy bitch,” Haruka laughed.  “Oh my god. I hate this school.”

Saki kept laughing.  She realized, somewhat more distantly, that she and Haruka were still holding hands.

* * *

Two down.  One to go. 

Judai clung to a rock, one wing hanging limp at the wrong angle, and swore softly.  Only one cutting of Armityle remained, and it was the big one. He’d pulled the other two out by the roots and burned them beyond recognition, but this one, the one that looked like a grotesque almost-Raviel, still shrieked at him, sending writhing tentacles everywhere.  Fuck. Could he finish this by himself? Fuck again. He hoped the kids had gotten out safely. Stupid, stupid Judai! Telling them to run, but run where? Fuck, fuck, fuck. He needed to finish this up!

He launched himself into the air at the almost-Phantasm, and was instantly met by a net of fleshy vines that caught at his wings and almost tried to rip them off like some child ripping the wings off a butterfly.  Yubel shrieked, and the Phantasm shrieked then, too, as the pain ricocheted back at it through Yubel’s power.

Even so, it didn’t stop trying to yank and pull at Judai, even though it felt every bit of screaming pain that Judai did.  Fuuuck, how long could he hold up against this — 

Rainbow light cut through the darkness, slicing through the tentacles that held Judai.  He dropped — but not far, landing on the smooth, soft back of...Rainbow Dragon!

Judai swung his gaze around.  There, on a lower platform — Johan!

“You’re back!” he shouted.

Johan shot him a grin.

“Thought you could use a hand cleaning up,” he said.

“Oh, fuck, could I, though.”

A relieved grin broke over Judai’s face, and he flipped back onto his hands and knees on top of Rainbow Dragon.

All right.  Time to finish this up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> well
> 
> i totally didn't mean to post this yet but uh
> 
> i guess it is technically the 29th at this point so....i won't confuse people by deleting it and reposting it later lol


	30. The End -- For Now

“Is spending the middle of autumn in the hospital wing going to turn out to be some kind of tradition for you all?” Ayukawa asked with a sigh.

“God, I hope not,” said Minato.

Nina groaned with agreement.

The hospital wing definitely was more full than usual, that was for sure, Saki thought with a sigh.  And, as Ayukawa-sensei had implied...Saki was a little miffed to find that this had been about the same time last year that they had been in the hospital wing after their _last_ encounter with Armityle.

Miu was fast asleep in the chair next to Saki’s bed, which Saki had insisted she didn’t need after one night of sleep, but Ayukawa was more insistent that she stay around for a bit to make sure that there were no lasting effects from her time in the other world.  A sullen Haruka was in the bed next to Saki. Though she looked a little less sullen, as Sparky had come back and rested their head on the bed beside her. They hadn’t really talked about anything they’d said in the other world. But Saki could see how soft Haruka’s eyes had gotten, and the soft, tentative way she kept reaching to pet Sparky behind the ears.

Minato, Nina, Taro, Mi-Gyeong, Toitoi, and Mylene were all here too, confined here until Ayukawa cleared them from their various burns and smoke inhalation.  Then there were the other people who’d fallen inside the pocket worlds taking up the rest of the beds. In fact, Saki was pretty sure they’d had to get more beds to fit everyone.  Minato and Nina argued about something inane, and Toitoi was clearly trying, and failing, to sleep. Mylene poked at xir phone, and Taro was chowing down on what was his sixth dog biscuit already.

Mostyn sat on the side of Anani’s bed again, even though Ayukawa had scolded him to get back to his own bed twice already.  They seemed to be playing some odd kind of rock-paper-scissors game, which included way more rules that included their unique ways of shifting their shape or colors.  Kaede sat on the foot of the bed, trying to figure out the game, asking a lot of questions.

Keiko had an uncommon number of students from other classes who kept coming in to check on her, including one tall Ra boy named Maxim who’d been by about four times by now.  Ayukawa ran over to shoo him out, and Keiko waved goodbye to him, smiling to herself.

“What did you pay him to visit you?” Miu mumbled in her sleep.

“Hey!  I can have friends,” said Keiko.  “I mean. I can have friends without paying them.”

“Okay, but how did you manipulate him into liking you,” Miu asked again, cracking open an eye.

Keiko stuck her tongue out at Miu, but she winked.

Even Andersen-sensei was here, looking very miffed, along with Saya, who was playing some kind of handheld video game and swearing a lot.  Ayukawa bustled over to tell her that she would need to put that away if she couldn’t be quiet about it.

“Ugh!  But you don’t understand, this level is pissing me off!”

“Give it to me to play it for you then, Saya-chan.  I can beat it.”

Saki turned, brightening, to hear Hinata’s voice.

Hinata swept into the room with all of the grace and strength that belonged to her.  She looked positively resplendent in comparison to how she’d looked for most of the year.  Her skin was glowing, her hair was smooth and shiny, and her eyes were bright, without a hint of the bags from before.  She pulled out a chair beside Saya’s bed and plopped down without even a hint of a shake — she even looked older, closer to the age that she was supposed to be, at least in her twenties instead of in her late teens.

“Don’t you dare touch this,” Saya said, snatching the game out of her reach. “Last time you deleted my save.”

“That was like, what?  A billion years ago?”

“Hinata-san,” Saki said, waving.  “Are you feeling better?”

Hinata shot her a huge grin and a peace sign.

“I’m feeling _incredible,”_ she said.  “Like wow. This is how normal people feel all the time?  I could get used to this.”

She took advantage of Saya’s distracted eyes towards Saki to snatch the game away and turn so that she was out of reach. Saya swore and dove for her, collapsing against her back and trying to reach around her while Hinata stretched her arms out far away, laughing.  Ayukawa looked like she was about to have a fit.

It didn’t help her look when Yuki-sensei peeked through the door.  He winced and waved nervously at Ayukawa.

“I gave them some time, am I allowed to talk to them now?” he asked.

“It’s been _one day_!” Ayukawa said.

“Ayukawa-san, can _I_ at least please be allowed to talk to my spouses?” Andersen asked.

Saki’s eyes widened.  Mylene dropped xir phone, and Toitoi shot straight up.  Nina and Minato stopped arguing. Saya covered her mouth with one hand to hide the snort.

“When did you guys get _MARRIED?_ ” Nina squealed.

“You guys were dating???” said Toitoi. “Like — you were a couple?  Holy shit, how did I not notice?”

Mylene stared at Yuki for a moment, mouthing to xirself before asking out loud, “spouses?  Plural?”

“Congratulations!” Taro said, his tail wagging up a storm behind him.

Yuki went beet red, and Andersen turned a light pink.

“That’s not the important question here right now, okay,” Yuki said, waving an arm.

“I disagree,” said Mostyn.

Ayukawa threw her hands in the air with a soft cry of despair.

“It seems I don’t have a choice but to let you all run wild in my ward.  Go ahead, talk to them. But don’t overexert them!”

“Yes, ma’am,” Yuki said, saluting.

Ayukawa swooped out of the room after Yuki stepped in, and he winced again at her glare.

“I’m an adult and she still has that look down on me,” he muttered.

He sighed, and then walked across the room towards Andersen first, grabbing his hands for a moment.  Saki looked away politely when Yuki gave him a quick kiss. She looked back when she heard Yuki sit down on a chair next to Andersen, heaving a sigh.

“Well,” he said.  “This is a familiar place for some of us.”

“Let’s make a pact to not meet here next year,” said Taro.

“Sounds good to me,” said Mostyn.

“I can agree with that,” Anani said, going light blue with some exasperation.

Yuki let out a soft chuckle, curling his hand into Andersen’s on the bed beside him.  For a moment, they just sat like that. Saki finally broke the silence.

“So...what do you want to talk about?” she asked.

Yuki sighed again.  He looked very tired.  Across the room, Hinata folded her arms and waited.  The only sound was Saya’s game making little beeping sounds on low volume.  Minato shot her a look, and Saya stuck her tongue out back at them.

“I figure you guys deserve to know what all happened,” he said.  “I’ll be filling in the rest of the class at the meeting tonight, but since you won’t be out of the hospital yet, I wanted to catch up with you.”

He took another moment to compose himself.

“We were careless.  And it’s on us. I want to apologize to all of you for what happened — this was mostly my fault for not making sure Armityle was properly off the island.”

Hinata let out a soft snort, and Yuki sent her a look.

“I don’t want to hear it from you again,” he said.

“You can’t act like it’s not true, though,” she said, shrugging at him.  “The truth is, it was my fault. However unintentional it was.”

Saki shot her a concerned look, lips parting with surprise.  Yuki tried to speak, but Hinata continued.

“When you all took me out of the world where Armityle was keeping me, it left a cutting of itself in my soul,” she said.  “My attacks weren’t _just_ panic attacks, although, that didn’t help.  They were moments when Armityle was using me to lay down more seeds in Duel Academia.”

Yuki cut in then.

“Which you couldn’t have foreseen, but I should have,” he said stubbornly.

Hinata rolled her eyes, and said something under her breath that made Saya stuff her fist in her mouth to stop the laughter.

“Anyway,” Yuki said, shooting the both a look.  “Armityle was much smarter than I gave it credit for.  Not only did it use Hinata as a foothold back into Duel Academia...but it also used Kylie.”

A brief hush fell over the room, as though everyone were hold their breath.  Saki’s hands tightened into the covers. Kylie was the only one of those involved with the incident who wasn’t here.  Yuki-sensei said he’d had to take her to another, special hospital in the spirit world. She’d been so heavily infected with Armityle’s presence that it was a wonder she wasn’t dead.

“So Kylie _was_ the one making people disappear,” Mi-Gyeong said quietly.

Yuki-sensei nodded, looking grim.

“Again, it was our mistake,” he said.  “We left the abandoned dorm for too long.  I’m not sure how Kylie found that spellbook, or who taught her how to use it, but that was some very dangerous stuff she was playing with.  Armityle took advantage of her, and made her lay down traps.”

“Kylie likely thought all she was doing was laying down traps to make people she didn’t like vanish,” Andersen said.  “But what she was doing was putting powered souls into...seeds, of a sort. Seeds that Armityle used to feed its cuttings, trying to regrow itself as a Phantasms at Duel Academia, outside of its seal.”

“You’re telling me that our souls were used to fertilize an evil god?” Haruka said.

“Essentially, that’s what was happening.”

Haruka made a gagging sound, and Sparky shoved their head under her hand.

“Wait, even me?” Kaede said, pointing at herself.  “I don’t have any powers, though.”

Yuki glanced at Kaede.  For a moment he frowned.  Then he seemed to shake himself out of it.

“Well, I think you had the unfortunate chance of being in the wrong place at the wrong time,” he said.  “But all souls have power, anyway, so...yes, I’m sorry, even you.”

Kaede shivered, sticking her tongue out.

“But it’s...gone now, right?” Mylene said, biting xir lip.

“Yes,” Yuki said.  “The cuttings were destroyed completely.  Saki here popped all of the bubble dimensions, so it no longer has energy to sustain it.”

Yuki put his hand on the sword still leaning against the wall near Saki’s bed.  Saki ducked her head when everyone looked at her, blushing.

“This was some pretty intense alchemy.  You should really be proud of yourself.”

“I don’t know what to do with that anymore,” she admitted, blushing.  “The last sword I got disappeared.”

Andersen chuckled.

“Well, it’s your alchemy, so you can keep it.  Otherwise, Judai and I can find someplace for it.”

Saki bit her lip, looking down at the sword.

“Um...you guys can hang on to it for now, at least.  I can’t bring that home with me.”

Yuki smiled, nodding.  He took the sword and laid it lightly against his lap, running his hand over the blade.

“And beyond that bit, Kylie’s currently being detoxed, and the spellbook destroyed itself when you guys tried to save her,” Yuki said, nodding at Mi-Gyeong, Mylene, and Toitoi.

“So _that’s_ where the fire came from,” Mi-Gyeong said thoughtfully.

“So you’re totally sure this time?” Haruka said, glaring at the two teachers.  “You’re totally sure that you got rid of it _this time_?”

Andersen and Yuki exchanged a glance.  Then Yuki ran a hand over his face.

“The truth is, I don’t think we can ever be totally sure,” he said.  “Armityle is tenacious. It might be that it’s just biding its time. But it wants to come back.  I’ve gotten rid of the last of the abandoned dorm, and the island seems clear. But I can’t promise you with any perfect certainty, and I won’t lie to you.”

For some reason, this seemed to take Haruka aback.  And then she nodded slowly. She seemed, surprisingly, satisfied with this answer.

Yuki looked around at the room though, with a very grim look on his face.

“I wanted this school to be a safe place for all of you,” he said.  “A different space that what I had when I was your age. So I want to apologize again, for making you all go through this.  And...and if you’d like to transfer to another school, I can promise you that I’ll do what I can to help, and that I’ll give you all the protection I can.  I can’t promise you that this school will ever be the safe place I want it to be — or that any place where you gather kids with powers like ours will be.”

For a moment, the whole room was quiet.  Saki felt sick to her stomach, as sick as she had when she’d learned of the option to transfer up classes.  Her tongue tied, and she wasn’t sure what to say.

But then she looked around the room.  She saw Haruka with her hand on Sparky’s head, looking distant.  She said Nina, with her hair singed and her face set, clearly never going to leave this school behind for the world.  Taro, with the crumbs still on his lips, who had his ears plastered to his head, but then perked them up, looking determined again.  Mylene and Toitoi exchanged a glance, and then exchanged one with Mi-Gyeong, and all of them smiled, raising a fist towards each other.  Anani and Mostyn looked at each other — Anani pure white and her skin swirling with faint hints of yellow, and Mostyn with both his hands having transformed into clear, watery talons at the moment.  Kaede got up from Anani’s bed and wandered over to Saki’s, flopping down next to her. She shot Saki a big smile.

Saki smiled back.  She took Kaede’s hand and squeezed it.  She looked around the room, and found determination in every set of eyes she met.

“Yuki-sensei,” she said.  “I hope it’s not wrong of me to speak for everyone, but I don’t think there’s any place in the world that we’d rather be than here.  Danger and all.”

* * *

“Are you really leaving?” Saki said.

Saya threw her arm around Saki’s shoulder.

“Don’t cry, kiddo!” she said, patting her on the head with her other hand.  “This isn’t goodbye forever. But now that Hinata’s in tip-top shape, we’re ready to see what’s out there for us.”

“I’m not going to cry,” Saki muttered.

She definitely was about to cry.  But she quickly rubbed at her eyes with the heels of her hand and pretended that the tears weren’t there.

The boat’s horn blared over the harbor, and Saya looked up.  Hinata sat on one of the pillars on the edge of the harbor, the wind playing with her hair as she stared out at the ocean.  When Saya’s arm slipped off of Saki’s shoulders, Miu burrowed herself under Saki’s arm, glomming onto her side. Saki hugged her around the shoulders.

“We’ll miss you,” said Minato.

“Yeah, and next time I see you, I’m definitely gonna break your lead on our chess record,” Kaede said, shaking her fist at her.

Saya laughed.  She ruffled Kaede’s hair, and then grasped Minato’s hand.

“I don’t think I could have survived this year without you all,” she said.  “Thanks, guys. I’ll miss you too.”

Nina started bawling.  Taro patted her back reassuringly.  

“Hey, stop that!” Saya said, sniffling. “I’m going to cry too!”

She started crying anyway as she reached over to give Nina a big hug.  Nina hugged her back, bawling and blubbering something about missing her.  Saya dragged Taro into the hug next.

“Don’t worry, squirts!  I’ll be back the next time something crazy happens at this school!”

Saki laughed, still blinking back a few tears.

“I guess you’ll never really leave, huh?” she said.

Saya finally broke off her hug, and wiped her own tears away.

“Never,” she said.  “I don’t think you can ever really leave Duel Academia.”

She ruffled Saki’s hair then, and then scooped Miu away from her to lift her off the ground in a hug.

“You kids better promise me that one of you is the third-year rep for next year’s grad duel!  I’ll come back only for that!”

“Saki’s got you covered there,” Minato said, patting her back, and Saki briefly spluttered as everyone laughed.

Saya finally let Miu down.  

“Hey, Hina-nee!  Are you gonna say goodbye to these kiddos or what!”

“I’m absorbing the ocean into my eyes, give me a second!”

“We’re gonna be on a boat for _hours_ , you can do it then!”

Hinata let out a teasing roar as she jumped up from the pillar throwing her arms into the air.  She was grinning when she came back to meet the group, hugging Saki first and squeezing her into her chest so hard that Saki almost couldn’t breathe.

“You kids stay out of trouble,” she said.

“We can promise nothing,” said Minato.

“We’ll do our best,” said Taro, his ears flickering with embarrassment.

Hinata just laughed as she made her way around giving out hugs and claps on the shoulder.

“Yeah, right, you mean,” she said, shaking her head.  “No such thing on this island.”

She pumped her fists in the air over her head.

“Duel Academia!  I’m finally graduating!” she shouted at the faraway school.

“See ya next time!!” Saya shouted along with her, and both of them started waving with both arms.

Saki couldn’t stop giggling even though her eyes were still blurry with tears.  Hinata let her arms fall to her sides. She inhaled sharply, and let it all out, her whole body relaxing.

“Where will you go?” Nina sniffled.  “What are you guys going to do?”

“Well, first, we’re going to go surprise mom and dad with Hinata’s arrival,” Saya said.

“It’s been almost a year and you didn’t tell your parents she was back??” Saki squeaked.

“Hey, not my fault.  They divorced like, twelve years ago, and mom doesn’t talk to me anymore.  Dad barely ever answers his texts. We’ll do it in person now that she’s not dying.”

“And then, who knows,” Hinata said, shaking her head and smiling into the wind.  “There’s a whole world out there. I can’t wait to see it again.”

The boat blared its horn again.

“I think that’s our cue,” Saya said.  She grasped Saki’s hands for a moment, squeezing them.  “Hey. You stay tough, you hear me? You’ve got my number.  Text or call if you need anything.”

“I will,” Saki said.

Saya eyed her suspiciously.

“I mean it,” she said.  “Don’t you do that thing where you think you can’t bother anyone and never text me.”

Saki flushed.  Saya read her too well.

“I promise!  I really promise,” she said.

“You’d better, you troublemaker,” Saya said, flicking her on the nose.

Hinata hesitated one more moment before they both turned towards the boat.

“Thank you,” she said, looking serious for the first time.  “You, and the whole class, and everyone. You guys brought me home, and you guys helped me get better.”

Saki blushed.  She felt Miu snuggle up against her again, pressing her face against her side in embarrassment.  

“We didn’t do much,” said Minato.

“Don’t give me that,” Hinata said.  Then she smiled. “You kids are the most courageous kids I’ve ever met.  Keep it up.”

She raised a fist up towards them, as though it were some spell, Saki and the others all did it in return.

“Bye!!” Saya shouted as she and Hinata headed towards the boat.  “Keep in touch!!”

“We will!” Nina shouted.

“Don’t get into much trouble yourselves!” Minato shouted.

They were on the boat now, and Saya ran to the railing to start waving with both arms.  Saki ran forwards to the edge of the harbor, waving back. The others followed her, and as the boat pulled away, they all waved and waved and waved.

Saki’s eyes were blurred with tears and her arms ached by the time it was too far away to see the boat.  She let her arms fall back to her sides, and stared off at the blurry ocean.

“Well,” Kaede said, heaving a sigh.  “What now?”

“Back to normal old school stuff for what...oh god.  We still have a whole half a year left!” Nina said. “Did we already use up all of our adventure quota already??”

“I can handle that,” said Saki in a rush.

They all laughed for a moment.  Saki giggled as an ocean breeze tickled her hair.  There were still some tears in her throat, but she didn’t feel badly about them.

Something...something niggled at her though.  Was she forgetting something? She stopped giggling, frowning as she looked around the group.  She definitely felt like she was forgetting something. Oh no. Had someone _not_ come back from the other dimensions, and she’d forgotten them maybe??  Oh no, oh no, oh —

It hit her all at once.

“Kakon-senpai!” she blurted.  “We never checked if Kakon-senpai was alright!!”

* * *

Ashikaga Kakon was not in any of their pagers.  When they went through the school database, they didn’t see his name anywhere.  She ran to Obelisk and asked which room was Ashikaga Kakon’s, and the students all looked at her like she was crazy, insisting that there was no third-year by that name.  

Saki was about to have a panic attack.  Kakon had fallen into the other dimensions, and he hadn’t come back!!  They had to find a way to get him back! Maybe her sword — she needed her sword!  She’d ask Yuki-sensei for her sword back!

“Saki, breathe,” Minato said, holding her hand.  “We’re going to find him. Let’s not panic just yet.”

“Should we call the teachers, though?” Kaede said.  

“Where did you last see him?” Nina said.

“In...the library,” Saki said.  “We always met in the library.”

“Let’s check there, then!” Taro said.  “Maybe Micchan will be able to sense if there’s a pocket dimension.”

Miu nodded.  With her friends clustered all around her, Saki felt some of her panic starting to subside.  They were right. There was no need to panic. Kakon would be all right. They’d find him, no problem.

Nina led the way to the library, humming a loud tune as she swung her arms back and forth.  Minato was still holding Saki’s hand, and Miu clung to her other arm. Kaede grabbed hold of Nina’s hand and started to hum off key along with her, and Taro laughed.

“He’s usually towards the back,” Saki said.  “Maybe someone should get ready to call Yuki-sensei, in case something goes wrong.”

“Good idea,” Kaede said.  “Uh...I’ll do that. Since I don’t have any magic powers to use.”

She hung back, and Taro stayed with her while she started to dial out the number on the pager.  Saki headed towards the back of the library, Minato, Nina, and Miu following behind her. Her throat was dry as they wound their way deeper into the library.  Minato had said they’d found a secret passageway from this library to the Phantasms’ chamber. Yuki-sensei had gotten it filled in, but she couldn’t believe how close she’d been to that growing darkness this whole time.

She reached the back table where she always met Kakon.

“Kakon-senpai?” she called.  “Are you...”

She stopped, and Minato almost ran into her, bumping her forward a step.

At the seat where she usually met Kakon, there was a book left behind, open to a page.  Saki approached slowly.

The book was a yearbook, she saw with a start.  Her eyes flicked over the pictures first — and she stopped dead.

Kakon’s face looked back at her.  Ashikaga Kakon, the name said. Her heart quickened.  He hadn’t disappeared! The book still had him in it! But then she heard Minato let out a little swear, and she looked at them with surprise.  Minato reached for the yearbook and turned it closed. Saki understood Minato’s shock immediately.

 _This is a yearbook from almost twenty-five years ago_ , Saki thought, her eyes widening.   _That was around when Hinata was in school!_

There was a piece of paper taped to the cover as well.  Saki took it off and unfolded it, hands shaking.

“What does it say?” Nina hissed.

Saki didn’t respond right away.  Her eyes simply flicked across the note, back and forth.

_Dear Saki:_

_Were you surprised?  Ashikaga Kakon no longer attends this school.  He was a mediocre student, and no one remembers him.  So he was an easy face to wear without suspicion._

_I want to be honest with you, Saki-chan: talking to you was a lot of fun.  Really! I enjoyed our friendship while it lasted. And your performance this year, handling everything that you did — the hazing, the dimension bubbles, becoming friends with Haruka...it was more than I ever could have hoped for!  Great job!_

_Though, I hope you don’t think that your victory this time means it’s over.  It would have been nice if this plan had worked this year, but I’ll be honest with you one more time: I had bigger plans anyway._

_Next time, let’s meet face to face.  No tricks._

_I’m looking forward to it._

The name signed to the bottom of the note made Saki’s stomach drop out.  She silently passed it to Minato, who grabbed it and looked through it.

“What does it _say_?” Nina whined, jumping from foot to foot.

Miu took Saki’s shaking hand, and Saki waited with choked breaths until Minato saw the name signed to the bottom.  Their face dropped with shock. They looked up at Saki, eyes wide.

“ _Armityle?_ ” they whispered.


	31. Epilogue

“So?  What do you think?”

“I think I’m pissed off that it was here, this whole time, right under our fucking noses.  Making friends with our students.”

Johan glanced at Judai over the table.  In the darkening night sky, all Johan could see with any clarity were his glowing orange and green eyes, a clear sign of his agitation.  Judai drummed his fingers over the table, almost snarling a little. His Yubel was showing quite a bit, and Johan reached his hand over the table to take Judai’s.

“This is all making me wish that I drank,” he said.

Johan laughed.

“It’s making me wish Manjoume was around, so I could ask him for a cigarette.”

“You don’t smoke.”

“This makes me wish I could start.”

Judai let out a little snort, but he wasn’t one for mirth tonight.  They sat in silence for a long moment. Judai was still holding the note that Saki had brought to him, letting it hang from his fingers on the side of his chair.  The note left by Armityle, of all people.

“It solves the last mystery,” Judai said, shaking his head.  “That’s how Armityle was contacting Kylie. He wore the face of an Obelisk student, and passed his letters on to them to deliver to Kylie.”

“It does.”

“But why Saki?  Hinata was the one he infected.  So why was it her that he focused on befriending?  He didn’t even try to infect her, or put any of his cuttings into her.  He just...made friends with her. Why?”

Johan shook his head.

“I don’t think we’re going to figure it out tonight,” he said.  “We should think about something else instead.”

“Like what?”

Johan shot him a pointed glance, and Judai sighed.

“Right.  I shouldn’t have brought it up yet.”

“You’re positive that Hisakawa-san is developing powers?”

“I sensed it a little in the hospital.  And I overheard her telling Saki about the weird dreams she had that made her go try and confront Kylie.  That’s not normal — I think she’s starting to develop oracle powers.”

“Did you talk to Saiou about it?  Have him try and divine?”

“Not yet.  He’s really tired from everything he’s been trying to divine for us this year.  I want him to take a break. And...I think Kaede’s going to be okay for now. I don’t want to overwhelm her with the idea that she might _not_ be normal.”

Johan nodded, looking back up at the starry sky.

“It’s not normal, is it?” he said softly.  “For people to develop their powers so late.”

Judai shook his head.

“There’s only one possible explanation,” he said.  “Someone in the Osiris Dorm is an enflamer.”

“Do you think that’s why Armityle targeted Saki?”

“No, I don’t think it’s her.  If it was, she’d have awakened Kaede’s powers a long time ago.  Besides, I think her sudden awakening into alchemy was probably caused by enflaming.  And I don't think it was my fault this time.”

Johan let out a small snort of laughter, and then fell silent.

They stared out at the night for a moment.  And then, off in the distance, a firework exploded against the sky.  Judai sat up straight, and in the distance, Johan heard a squeal and a roll of laughter.  Someone shouted, and then another firework shot into the sky. Johan saw the burn of sparklers swinging through the air in front of the faraway upperclassmen dorm.  A dragon let off a roar, too, and someone shouted, _“NINA!!”_

“Goddammit,” Judai swore, and Johan laughed.

“They’re going to be all right, Judai,” he said, squeezing Judai’s hand.  “You know that, right?”

Another firework went off, and more laughter echoed through the night.   _“Shoot the big one, shoot the big one!!” “Nina, dammit, you’re literally on fire!” “WHOOO, final exams are OVER, BITCHES!”_

Judai sighed, and Johan looked over to see him cracking a smile.

“Yeah,” he said.  “They are.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Surprise extra chapter! I couldn't leave it off on a note like last chapter, now could I? :3
> 
> This was a lot of fun like it was last year!! I hope you all enjoyed season 2 as well! I'm planning at least one more season for sure, probably to come out next September as well! Though I do feel like there were some things I wish I could have done more of with this season; unfortunately the heavier focus on plot did mean I lost out on some of the more fun, laid-back shenanigans that all of the kids could get into. So keep an eye out, I might write a few oneshot "OVA" chapters here and there before season 3 drops! (in fact, if any of you have anything you'd like to see, character interactions between ocs or with canon characters, lemme know! I always welcome ideas <3 )
> 
> Thank you to everyone who's followed this little side project of mine; it really means the world to me to hear that you guys love these dork OCs I've made as much as I do <3
> 
> I hope to see you on the OVAs, season 3, and my other works in the future! But until then, game on! <3


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